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15th out of 448 books
—
382 voters
Zami: A New Spelling of My Name
by
Audre Lorde
ZAMI is a fast-moving chronicle. From the author's vivid childhood memories in Harlem to her coming of age in the late 1950s, the nature of Audre Lorde's work is cyclical. It especially relates the linkage of women who have shaped her . . . Lorde brings into play her craft of lush description and characterization. It keeps unfolding page after page.
--Off Our Backs
--Off Our Backs
Paperback, 264 pages
Published
January 1st 1982
by Crossing Press
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in college, in the late 80s and early 90s, i discovered that i had two aunts. this is one (and this is another). aunt Audre intimidated me at first. she was a stern, moody, melancholy woman who had lived a life of so many ups and downs. but as i got to know her, her innate gentleness became clear. this was a woman with so much empathy and understanding for the people around her. this was a lady who had felt pain in her life and would be able to understand my pain as well. she told me stories of...more
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Audre Lorde recounts the first half of her life in an amazing blend of her own poetry, popular songs, journal entries, and memories that are startling in their exactness and fairness. Her ability to recount her extreme loneliness and desire for companionship at being Black in gay scenes, gay in Black crowds and female and working class in the U.S. Her amazing sympathy for the women and men whom she loved and hurt/was hurt by is a testament to her desire to create great networks and bridges betwe...more
Audre Lorde's beatiful autobiography of her child- and early-adulthood. She's been prized for her "sensuality" in writing but this is no chicklit - her account of the lesbian bar scene in 1950's America will fascinate anyone interested in these forgotten pockets of culture. After reading it, what most amazed me about her was her unpretensiousness and her willingness to expose herself completely. Few writers have been so insightful when talking about themselves.
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I think it was Justin who told me that reading this book made him want to scream, and at the time, I was only familiar with two books of Audre Lorde's poetry, so I didn't know that her prose could punch like this. Not that I was not expecting it, but maybe I was limiting in my image of her as a poet. It's not so much that this "biomythography" punches, but it builds the heat up in your body as you read, which gives you the kind of energy necessary to do something because you could die your death...more
Aug 14, 2007
Julia
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
all black lesbians and their allies
Shelves:
readthismorethanonce
this is my favorite audre lorde book. it was so interesting to read about her life growing up in harlem and her coming out process in the 1950s... it explores racism within the gay community, heterosexism and homophobia in society as a whole... and is just an overall great story of a woman's journey of self-discovery. anyone - straight/gay/queer/whatevah - has something to relate to in this book.
AUDRE LORDE is the shiznit!
AUDRE LORDE is the shiznit!
Title: Zami: A New Spelling of My Name
Author: Audre Lorde
Structure: 31 chapters
Pages: 256
Plot: This “biomythography” details the first twenty-five years or so of Audre Lorde’s life. Lorde’s parents are immigrants from Grenada. Her mother is extremely strict, and her father is distant. Lorde grows up with very bad eye sight and a love of reading. As she grows up, she begins to realize she is an outsider due to her race and sexual attraction for women. As an adult Lorde goes to various classes, j...more
Author: Audre Lorde
Structure: 31 chapters
Pages: 256
Plot: This “biomythography” details the first twenty-five years or so of Audre Lorde’s life. Lorde’s parents are immigrants from Grenada. Her mother is extremely strict, and her father is distant. Lorde grows up with very bad eye sight and a love of reading. As she grows up, she begins to realize she is an outsider due to her race and sexual attraction for women. As an adult Lorde goes to various classes, j...more
My main frustration with this book is admittedly Lorde's use of the term "Biomythography." It's a pretentious categorization, though it is appropriate in the sense that Lorde does tend to mythologize her experience. The prose itself is handled well, though Lorde's methods of storytelling seem overly dramatic at times. For me, the nonsensical label of "biomythography" detracts from the work itself. Audre Lorde is a talented writer, but the invention of a new genre is not one of her achievements....more
Jun 20, 2007
Needleroozer
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
feminist, people of color, feminists of colore
Shelves:
life-stories
I'm not sure what I should say about this book, other than that it should be read by every feminist and person of color. It is an excellent book.
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I clearly stand alone in thinking this, and that's fine, but parts of this book were torture for me to get through. Especially in the latter half of the book, wherein Lorde invents 1000 different ways to say she loves a cavalcade of women who, by the end, I truly couldn't tell apart. I can appreciate the craft at work here, and that Lorde has a talent for language and is probably a great poet, but I just couldn't find a way to care about her life. I don't think her perspective is as unique as sh...more
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I kept forgetting the events in this book took place in the forties/fifties, which makes Audre Lorde's story all the more impressive and intriguing. People don't think much about the struggles in race, gender, and sexuality which were going on then, preferring to defer to the "progressive" sixties. Yet Lorde's book tells the story of her dealing with all these things as she grows up during these decades. Her perspective throws a new light on a time we associate with aproned housewives and the af...more
Fabulous autobiographical story. I read it in one day. It made me want to travel to South America and New York City.
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I enjoyed this book. It started off with a lot of self-examination about how she felt about what happened to her as a child, where the ending was more a description of what happened when. I liked the parts where she discussed how the women in her group were trying to figure out how to have relationships in a different (non-patriarchal) way. Her comments about being a black lesbian were also very informative, and her comments about being in a relationship with a white woman also hit home (and how...more
An honest and eloquent autobiography. So moving to see a famous poet and cultural figure write so frankly about her own sensuality, abortion, shoplifting, and cruelty. I must admit I don't understand the purpose here of the "biomythography." True, she calls her last lover Afrekete as a female incarnation of a West African trickster-orisha, Eshu. But this is a late move in the story, which for the most part straightforwardly recounts Lorde's formative years in 1940s and 50s New York. If large sec...more
Deeply poetic novel. The disturbing memoirs of a black woman growing up during a time of great racial tension. I loved how she could make you laugh out loud and cringe on command. A teacher in my first year of college assigned us a segment of this book. I'm grateful she did because it's lead to find this wonderful book. Before I read this book I always pictured the 50's as the happy times of Hot Rods and milkshakes. But this book opened my eyes to the uglier side that nobody ever seems to talk a...more
“And you did not come back to April
Though spring was a powerful lure
But bided your time in silence
Knowing the dead must endure.
And you came not again to summer
Nor till the green oaks were leaving
Traces of blood in the autumn
And there were hours for grieving.”
P124
“Often, just finding out another woman was gay was enough of a reason to attempt a relationship, to attempt some connection in the name of love without first regard to how ill-matched the two of you might really be. Such were the results...more
Though spring was a powerful lure
But bided your time in silence
Knowing the dead must endure.
And you came not again to summer
Nor till the green oaks were leaving
Traces of blood in the autumn
And there were hours for grieving.”
P124
“Often, just finding out another woman was gay was enough of a reason to attempt a relationship, to attempt some connection in the name of love without first regard to how ill-matched the two of you might really be. Such were the results...more
I love re-reading books years after I first discover them. The me of 20 years ago, when I first read this sweet autobiography of sister Audre's, was a much different creature than the me of 2011. I'm older, with creakier bones and years of dissapointments and hard lessons behind me. But her words touched me still. The added years between my 2nd reading and her youth in 1940s and 50s New York made her story even more amazing. So much has changed... and so much has not. Estrangement from family, t...more
Audre Lorde's "Zami" is a mixed bag of a book, so to speak. A friend warned me that it was amazing until she leaves college in the book, and after that, it's a bit yawn-tastic and circular. I tend to agree with him, though I wouldn't call the second half of the book boring--just less colorful, so to speak, which is funny because it's in the second half that all the love affairs and gay bars and shitty jobs arise. But Lorde's prose is fluid and enjoyable to read, she paints portraits of presumabl...more
"After the first week, I wondered if I could stick it out. I thought that if I had to work under those conditions for the rest of my life I would slit my throat. Some mornings, I questioned how I could get through the eight hours of stink and dirt and din and boredom. At 8:00 A.M. I would set my mind for two hours, saying to myself, you can last two hours, and then there will be a coffee break. I'd read for ten minutes, and then I'd set myself for another two hours, thinking, now all right, you...more
If I could give this book 3 1/2 stars, I would. There's no question that Audre Lorde was an incredible writer and innovator. Lorde radicalized feminist and LGBTQ movements by pointing out the systematic racism informing both groups. As a queer woman, she challenged patriarchal and homophobic norms within the Civil Rights and antiracist movements. I've loved her essays and poetry, both of which informed me of a feminism that could transcend the feminisms of Gloria Steinem, Betty Freidan, and Naom...more
I know everyone loves Audre Lorde. I don't know enough of her but I do know that this biomythography was my first exposure of who she is. I didn't exactly like the book. The content was quite intriguing yet I can't say the same for the writing. I thought her voice was a little too passive for my taste. I felt like the story was moving forward but her voice stayed the same: unremarkable. This opinion of course might not be a true reflection of who she is. I heard that her poetry is amazing.
I purchased this book for a class I was taking in college. We ended up not reading it and it's been sitting in my bookshelf unread ever since. I have been putting off reading it because I thought it wasn't my style and thought it would be dull. I finally picked it up this month and I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. It still wasn't my favorite read though. I really am not into poetry and every time I found poetry speckled through this book, I couldn't help but groan. I found Audre's life...more
Audre Lorde's writing is beautiful and her story is engaging and inspiring. This book is an interesting look into life in New York in the 40s and 50s. Audre is born and raised in Harlem by West Indian parents and later becomes part of the (mostly white) downtown lesbian scene. Her story resonated with me because everywhere she goes she's a little bit of an outsider. I was disappointed by the Epilogue though, I thought it was far too simple and positive.
“I have felt the age-old triangle of mother father and child, with the 'I' at its eternal core, elongate and flatten out into the elegantly strong triad of grandmother mother daughter, with the 'I' moving back and forth flowing in either or both directions as needed.
Woman forever. My body, a living representation of other life older longer wiser. The mountains and valleys, trees, rocks. Sand and flowers and water and stone. Made in earth.”--Audre Lorde
Woman forever. My body, a living representation of other life older longer wiser. The mountains and valleys, trees, rocks. Sand and flowers and water and stone. Made in earth.”--Audre Lorde
A life in loves (the early part of a life, anyway): it's the author's process of self-discovery but structured by the succession of women she loved and lost, each of whom is a vivid character in her own right. Though Audre Lorde learned something from these women, they are autonomous, and that's what I liked the best about this book. That, and its sensuous erotic character (erotic even in the parts that are not about lovemaking). What a way to live. Never less than fully involving.
This is a self-described 'biomythography' of poet Audre Lorde's youth. The book starts out slow and is, at times a bit disturbing, but it gains momentum after the first few chapters. Highlights include beautifully written, colourful descriptions of the New York lesbian scene in the 1950s and poetic, moving accounts of Lorde's many loves. Her 1954 interlude in Mexico was so vibrant and colourful that I wanted to travel there in a time machine.
This quickly became one of my favorite books. Lorde's poetic descriptions, fascinating methods of storytelling that reads as if you are reading a beautifully written diary, and the honest quality of the ways in which she looks back on her own past experiences is altogether captivating, moving, and humbling. Lorde's experiences are also fascinating to engage with. As a queer woman of color writing about her experiences in the 40s and 50s, her words should be revered as she is writing a history o...more
It's rare to find an author that can make you feel like you're walking in her shoes as Audre Lorde does in this book. She brings you into her world, her thoughts, and her emotions. It's an interesting world out there and even more interesting when others try to ignore your many layers. In many situations your required to give up a part of who you are wether it be your gender, sexual orientation or race in order to have inner peace with the ignorance that surrounds you.
I love this book. It transformed gender and relationships,for me. I felt how useless a penis was. Being a young man at the time, not much mattered,maybe food. I felt Audre had complete understanding of male psyche. She knows what it feels to have a penis and not need one.she seems so manly in her femininity. So ashore so confident. This book gave me a different perspective on control and power.
Audre Lorde is not a character I could make a lot of personal connections with, which was probably a big part of this book's allure for me. Really interesting to see 1950's New York through the eyes of a Black gay woman from an immigrant family. Her descriptions are rich and vivid and the way in which she owns herself while giving so much to the women around her is powerful and provocative.
I first read this book for college class about the art of autobiography. I picked it up again the other day and was blown away (again) by how unflinchingly honest Lorde is as she recounts her childhood in Harlem and then her struggles fitting in as a black lesbian, trying to bring her different identities together. Her words drip off the page like poetry, rich and sensual and full of wisdom.
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Lorde's poetry was published very regularly during the 1960s — in Langston Hughes' 1962 New Negro Poets, USA; in several foreign anthologies; and in black literary magazines. During this time, she was politically active in civil rights, anti-war, and feminist movements. Her first volume of poetry, The First Cities (1968), was published by the Poet's Press and edited by Diane di Prima, a former cla...more
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