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The Beak in the Heart: True Tales of Misfit Southern Women
Vivid, dramatic portraits of the author’s “misfit” female ancestors and a candid, intimate memoir about family secrets and breaking free from the narrow confines of a “proper Southern woman.”
The Beak in the Heart is a memoir of growing up “Southern.” Betina Enzminger shares the poignant tales of women who preceded her—misfit women who defied authority and suffered the consequences in the repressive South Carolina of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Entzminger links several generations of women from pre-Civil War years to the present, including Victoria, a former slave and concubine to her third great uncle, Rosalee, a great aunt committed to the state hospital for forty years, and Louise, an aunt who unwittingly married a gay man at a time when divorce was not legal in South Carolina. She also shares candid details of her rebellious youth and her own struggles with marriage and parenthood.
In exploring the lives of her spirited female relatives, Entzminger—their educated, rebellious, and misfit twenty-first-century descendant—restores their voices and finds inspiration in their courage and integrity.
The Beak in the Heart speaks to all women, regardless of region of birth, who have felt that society has curbed their freedoms or silenced their voices.
The Beak in the Heart is a memoir of growing up “Southern.” Betina Enzminger shares the poignant tales of women who preceded her—misfit women who defied authority and suffered the consequences in the repressive South Carolina of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Entzminger links several generations of women from pre-Civil War years to the present, including Victoria, a former slave and concubine to her third great uncle, Rosalee, a great aunt committed to the state hospital for forty years, and Louise, an aunt who unwittingly married a gay man at a time when divorce was not legal in South Carolina. She also shares candid details of her rebellious youth and her own struggles with marriage and parenthood.
In exploring the lives of her spirited female relatives, Entzminger—their educated, rebellious, and misfit twenty-first-century descendant—restores their voices and finds inspiration in their courage and integrity.
The Beak in the Heart speaks to all women, regardless of region of birth, who have felt that society has curbed their freedoms or silenced their voices.
136 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 29, 2021
9 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
December 19, 2021
I enjoyed reading these stories that Entzminger tells about her family, having researched the lives of the women in her southern Appalachia family. Telling these stories together with her own, Entzminger identifies the common threads and patterns which draw their stories together.
March 7, 2022
I don’t know Bettina Entzminger, but, since she’s a virtual neighbor as someone who teaches college English only about 40 miles away, I can’t be entirely neutral as I reflect on this book.
As a collection of essays, which it really is, I like it very much. She takes a series of reflections on various female ancestors and relatives, and she meditates on each. The essays all do what good essays must – they let us see Entzminger finding herself in her subject. That is, she sees echoes of herself in the women she profiles, and those echoes carry weight. She locates some of the self-destructive qualities of her own life in the lives of those others. And then, having earned our trust through a powerful candor, she finds elements of strength in those others, strengths that have helped her overcome real and concrete challenges of her own.
I come to this collection, for the most part, because I am looking for models of how to tell deep family history. I contrast this one with another I read a few days ago, Bill Griffeth’s The Stranger in My Genes. Griffeth chose to tell his story chronologically as he learned it. I get that strategy; it’s one way to try to share the strange sense of wonder that comes with an archeology of personal history, a gradual recovery of the lives of the people who came before us.
This approach works much better. Entzminger reminds me of something I have probably known for a while. If I am going to succeed in recounting the 10-generation history – and historiography – of my family, I’m going to have to essay it – note the verb form of the word.
As big as a family story can be, there’s no vantage point that takes it all in. Essays can pick separate vantages and tell large pieces of that story. And then, as begins to happen here, those different pieces can inflect each other, reframing material from one to the next and giving a reader the information and opportunity to sense an overarching story.
I admit that this is a bit different from what I understood it to be in the promotional material I saw for it. I assumed there that this was more of a full-blown family history – more of what I am trying to figure out how to do myself. Instead, this is a provocative collection of family portraits, one that suggests how generations of women reacted to the weight of patriarchal figures and foreclosed opportunities.
It’s not quite what I expected, but I’m glad I stumbled onto it.
As a collection of essays, which it really is, I like it very much. She takes a series of reflections on various female ancestors and relatives, and she meditates on each. The essays all do what good essays must – they let us see Entzminger finding herself in her subject. That is, she sees echoes of herself in the women she profiles, and those echoes carry weight. She locates some of the self-destructive qualities of her own life in the lives of those others. And then, having earned our trust through a powerful candor, she finds elements of strength in those others, strengths that have helped her overcome real and concrete challenges of her own.
I come to this collection, for the most part, because I am looking for models of how to tell deep family history. I contrast this one with another I read a few days ago, Bill Griffeth’s The Stranger in My Genes. Griffeth chose to tell his story chronologically as he learned it. I get that strategy; it’s one way to try to share the strange sense of wonder that comes with an archeology of personal history, a gradual recovery of the lives of the people who came before us.
This approach works much better. Entzminger reminds me of something I have probably known for a while. If I am going to succeed in recounting the 10-generation history – and historiography – of my family, I’m going to have to essay it – note the verb form of the word.
As big as a family story can be, there’s no vantage point that takes it all in. Essays can pick separate vantages and tell large pieces of that story. And then, as begins to happen here, those different pieces can inflect each other, reframing material from one to the next and giving a reader the information and opportunity to sense an overarching story.
I admit that this is a bit different from what I understood it to be in the promotional material I saw for it. I assumed there that this was more of a full-blown family history – more of what I am trying to figure out how to do myself. Instead, this is a provocative collection of family portraits, one that suggests how generations of women reacted to the weight of patriarchal figures and foreclosed opportunities.
It’s not quite what I expected, but I’m glad I stumbled onto it.
February 8, 2022
I enjoyed this book very much. Entzminger gives a raw & honest look at herself and her struggles through life by examining genealogy and personality traits in her family.
She uses the information from her ancestors and adults from her childhood to learn about herself and draw strength to continue despite lifes "shit". She tells her story with a range of emotions- humor and some sadness. There were parts that brought me to tears. The love she has for her children is unconditional and I greatly admire her.
As I was reading the ending I couldn't help but think of Whitney Houstons words, "learning to love yourself it is the greatest love of all".
I look forward to reading more from this author
She uses the information from her ancestors and adults from her childhood to learn about herself and draw strength to continue despite lifes "shit". She tells her story with a range of emotions- humor and some sadness. There were parts that brought me to tears. The love she has for her children is unconditional and I greatly admire her.
As I was reading the ending I couldn't help but think of Whitney Houstons words, "learning to love yourself it is the greatest love of all".
I look forward to reading more from this author
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews