Middlesex
by Jeffrey Eugenides
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| Middlesex - why can't I enjoy this book? | 36 | 1 day ago, 07:42AM |
| new Oprah pick | 17 | 10/30/2007 07:54AM |
| Do you think... | 32 | 01/11/2008 04:45AM |
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Read in July, 2003
I got off the bus from Bumbershoot around 1 AM, exhausted. Convinced that even the cars speeding past my window couldn’t keep me from this night’s rest, I opened the door to a stench of exceptional vileness. Not a dead stench, or a spoiled food stench. This was the stench of sewage. From a spot in the center of the living room I surveyed the apartment and discovered the source: the commode and the area around it were covered in yuck. I dialed up the landlord. The exchange went somethin...more
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This would have been better as an NPR story or an episode of "This American Life" than a novel. Or maybe if someone other than Eugenides had written it. An interesting idea, and a few engrossing sex scenes (I like the "crocus" and the peep-tank, and the whole long flirtation with The Object drew me in completely), and a nice two pages toward the end when Julie accepts Cal for what he is. But the prose was awful: frequent maneuvers like "And me? That's simple. I was ...more
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Read in July, 2007
Don't judge a book by its cover.
I'd seen this book on the shelves of a number of friends and in the arms of a number of travelers, so I decided to pick it up. The title, "Middlesex", suggested English countryside to me. On the cover was what looked like a steamship, and a quote on the back began "Part Tristram Shanty, part-Ishmael..." So I came to the foolish conclusion that this was some 19th century English seafaring novel. (Typical.)
I couldn't have been more wro...more
I'd seen this book on the shelves of a number of friends and in the arms of a number of travelers, so I decided to pick it up. The title, "Middlesex", suggested English countryside to me. On the cover was what looked like a steamship, and a quote on the back began "Part Tristram Shanty, part-Ishmael..." So I came to the foolish conclusion that this was some 19th century English seafaring novel. (Typical.)
I couldn't have been more wro...more
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Read in July, 2007
Calliope Stephanides, menjalani kehidupannya selama 14 tahun sebagai seorang perempuan. Ia tidka menyadari ada keanehan dalam dirinya, sampai ketika ia beranjak dewasa, ia menyadari dirinya berbeda dengan teman-teman perempuan lainnya. Di usia dua belas tahun, ia belum mendapatkan menstruasi, berdada rata dan bertubuh lebih kurus dan jangkung. Di atas bibirnya, mulai ditumbuhi rambut tipis. Dan, ia lebih cenderung menyukai teman perempuan dibanding laki-laki. Keluarganya, terutama ibunya, Tessie...more
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Read in February, 2008
I'm torn on this book. On the one hand, I loved the story, which is, as another reviewer put it, 'the greatest, most incestuous Greek epic since the Iliad'. On the other hand, I had serious problems with some of the writing. I haven't seen my quibbles mentioned anywhere else, so I guess I'm alone on them. Or am I?
In a nutshell, Middlesex is the story of Cal, a Greek American who was born a hermaphrodite and raised as a girl before finally realising he was boy as a teenager. In ...more
In a nutshell, Middlesex is the story of Cal, a Greek American who was born a hermaphrodite and raised as a girl before finally realising he was boy as a teenager. In ...more
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recommends it for:
Oprah fans, Avid readers
Jeffrey Eugenides uses Calliope as his Muse – according to the Greek mythology, she’s the Muse of epic poetry –, as a narrator of his story. He must be a fan of the Greek myths as the novel’s full of allusion to Homer and the Illiad. The narrator eloquently unfold the story behind Calliope’s transformation, like the Chinese Princess Si Ling-Chi, as Eugenides puts it: upon discovering the unraveling of a silkworm cocoon that fell into her teacup, handing its loose end to her maidservant...more
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Read in July, 2007
"When I told my life story to Dr. Luce, the place where he invariably got interested was when I came to Clementine Stark. Luce didn't care about criminally smitten grandparents or silkworm boxes or serenading clarinets. To a certain extent, I understand. I even agree."
I agree too. This quote comes from page 263 and is really where the story picks up and gets into the subject the book promises--Cal's life as a hermaphrodite. Honestly, while the first 263 pages were interesti...more
I agree too. This quote comes from page 263 and is really where the story picks up and gets into the subject the book promises--Cal's life as a hermaphrodite. Honestly, while the first 263 pages were interesti...more
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Read in August, 2005
recommends it for:
anyone looking for a multi-generational family story and who finds the nonstandard intriguing,
I'd had this book on my To Read list for a while - original recommendation from mortal_belleza. I bought a trade PB copy either at the library book sale or the local used book store some time ago. After finishing As Nature Made Him : The Boy Who Was Raised as a Girl by John Colapinto, this book seemed a natural followup.
"I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit ...more
"I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit ...more
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Read in May, 2007
recommends it for:
everyone with an open mind, and even some of those with closed ones.
Mr. Eugenides can do everything, or at least I am convinced of such after reading Middlesex.
I passed on this book for a long time. I kept picking it up in bookstores and putting it down. I've seen quotes from it everywhere, all of which were beautiful, and kept hearing wonderful things about it from friends. To be perfectly honest, what kept me from picking it up in the subject: a hermaphrodite. I think of myself as someone with an open mind, but the thing is that I just wasn't sure i...more
I passed on this book for a long time. I kept picking it up in bookstores and putting it down. I've seen quotes from it everywhere, all of which were beautiful, and kept hearing wonderful things about it from friends. To be perfectly honest, what kept me from picking it up in the subject: a hermaphrodite. I think of myself as someone with an open mind, but the thing is that I just wasn't sure i...more
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Read in March, 2008
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
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Read in October, 2007
Middlesex is the story of the Greek Stephanides family. Narrated by Calliope (later Cal due to a genetic hermaphroditic condition), the story is a discovery of the reasons why Calliope becomes Cal, but is also the story of one family's journey. The narrative is omniscient and starts with Cal's grandparents, Desdemona and Lefty, who live in Turkey and are also brother and sister. Greek-Turkish wars force them to leave and negate reasons for not marrying each other. They emigrate to America and ma...more
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Read in September, 2007
Would have given this book two more stars except for one resounding disappointment I can't get past. I thought that one of the most important aspects of the book was entirely skipped over by the author without any explanation.
*Spoiler Alert* It's probably not a spoiler, but what I have to say may alleviate some of the intrigue - you have been warned.
I really, really, really wanted to know why Calliope 'chose' to live life as Cal once she learned that she was a biological male. It wa...more
*Spoiler Alert* It's probably not a spoiler, but what I have to say may alleviate some of the intrigue - you have been warned.
I really, really, really wanted to know why Calliope 'chose' to live life as Cal once she learned that she was a biological male. It wa...more
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recommends it for: Lindsay Moore
Read in March, 2008
recommended to Ed by:
Janie Ondracekrecommends it for: Lindsay Moore
I had no exposure to this books contents or notoriety when I picked it up. As I read the praise-blurbs in the front (a habit I need to kick) I started getting an idea of what I was in for...and I assumed that if anything, this novel was gonna try really, really hard. And it did. But my ultimate feeling about this is that it was sincere and earnest, not posing.
It contained a bit more violence than I am ordinarily comfortable with, but where I object to this kind of unprepared brutality in ...more
It contained a bit more violence than I am ordinarily comfortable with, but where I object to this kind of unprepared brutality in ...more
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Read in December, 2007
Jeffrey Eugenides' "Middlesex" is a "story of a single gene through time" (pg4). The story is a autobiography of the recessive mutation of Caliope Helen Stephanides's fifth chromosome. This loose chromosome reveals itself in Cal/Caliope who is born a girl and, at puberty, matures into a man. But, the story is much more than a sexy look into the strange life of a hermaphradite. It spins the story of a melting pot of science and a family tree (in this case, a mulberry one). In ...more
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Read in November, 2007
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
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Read in April, 2008
recommended to Kassandra by:
Big K sale rack recommendationsrecommends it for: Anyone who ever played doctor with a relative growing up
I'd been seeing this book in the stores for a while now. It's always one of the highlighted books, I guess because it won a Pulitzer. So I finally picked it up at the K-mart in Tehachapi, California, because, really, where else would you expect to find an award winning novel about a Greek hermaphrodite on sale?
Actually, I didn't know it was about a hermaphrodite until I started reading it. I originally thought it was about three generations of Greek immigrant women who come over on a steam ...more
Actually, I didn't know it was about a hermaphrodite until I started reading it. I originally thought it was about three generations of Greek immigrant women who come over on a steam ...more



























