The Autobiography of My Mother
From AwardAnnals
| Book: | The Autobiography of My Mother |
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| Author: | Jamaica Kincaid |
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| Publisher: | Farrar Straus & Giroux |
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Reviews
Amazon.com
In The Autobiography of My Mother, Jamaica Kincaid’s disturbing, compelling novel set on the island of Dominica, she writes, “My mother died at the moment I was born, and so for my whole life there was nothing standing between myself and eternity.” Born to a doomed Carib woman and a Scottish African policeman of increasing swagger and wealth, narrator Xuela spends a lifetime unanchored by family or love. She disdains the web of small and big lies that link others, allowing only pungent, earthy sensuality—a mix of blood and dirt and sex—to move her. Even answering its siren call, though, Xuela never loses sight of the sharp loss that launched her into the world and the doors through which she will take her leave. —Alex Freeman
Barnes and Noble
In The Autobiography of My Mother language sometimes works to mitigate defeat. Still, the singular achievement of The Autobiography of My Mother rests in its balancing of psychoanalytical and historic burdens; to these overlapping legacies, Kincaid is always careful to add the role of gender. Xuela Claudette Richardson, daughter of Xuela Claudette Desvarieux, makes certain that her passionate interlude never swallows whole the larger story of the losses and defeats that went into crafting the self she grasps so tightly. Autobiography is a finely crafted story of denial.
