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    My Animal Life: A Memoir
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    My Animal Life: A Memoir
    Unavailable
    My Animal Life: A Memoir
    Ebook276 pages4 hours

    My Animal Life: A Memoir

    By Maggie Gee

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    How do you become a writer, and why? Maggie Gee's journey starts a long way from the literary world in a small family in post-war Britain. At seventeen, Maggie goes, a lamb to the slaughter, to university. From the 1960s onwards she lives the defining events of her generation: the coming of the Pill and sexual freedom, tremors in the British layer-cake of class and race. In the 1980s, Maggie finally gets published, falls in love, marries and has a daughter -- but for the next three decades and beyond, she survives, and sometimes thrives, by writing. This frank, bold memoir dares to explore the big questions: success and failure, sex, death and parenthood -- our animal life. 'A wise and beautiful book about what it feels like to be alive -- I really loved it' Zadie Smith 'Exceptionally interesting and brave ... a wonderful book' Claire Tomalin 'A fine, honest, complex portrait of an artist's mind' Michele Roberts, Independent 'Every word strikes like a hammer on an anvil, throwing off sizzling sparks' Bidisha, The f word 'Anyone who yearns for that lost post-war Britain would do well to read this vivid, minutely observed memoir ...Gee has a sensuous eye for detail' Sinclair McKay, Telegraph 'It is a testament to Gee's skill with structure, her lightness of touch and her honesty, particularly about the most painful episodes, that she has fashioned this account of a fundamentally satisfying and happy writer's life into such a page-turner.' Melissa Benn, New Statesman 'Maggie Gee writes with such courage and wit. This is a vivid portrait of a woman finding her way through the maze of class ridden post war England, the 60's, feminism and how to be a mother and a writer.' Diana Melly 'Highly recommended for all aspiring writers' Bernardine Evaristo 'Observant, honest and sensitively-written...' Michael Holroyd 'Fresh and funny ... with a zest for living that bounces off the page...' Psychologies 'Sensitive, honest, courageous, stylish' The Times '[Gee's] utterly compelling on the rollercoaster of writing life, from early success to rock-bottom rejection. Often joyous; infinitely wise; passionate and poised, this is a book you'll want to sit in silence with and hug to yourself -- then start again.' Daily Mail

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTelegram Books
    Release dateAug 12, 2011
    ISBN9781846590962
    Unavailable
    My Animal Life: A Memoir
    Author

    Maggie Gee

    Maggie Gee is the author of twelve critically acclaimed novels, including The White Family (shortlisted for the Orange and IMPAC prizes), and a memoir, My Animal Life. She is a Fellow and Vice-President of the Royal Society of Literature, and Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University. Her work has been translated into fourteen languages. Maggie Gee was awarded an OBE in 2012 for services to literature.

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    Reviews for My Animal Life

    3.5/5

    17 ratings6 reviews

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    • 4/5
      I've never read any of Maggie Gee's novels, but I enjoyed reading her autobiography. Gee grew up in a working-class family and went on to Oxford and a literary career. While Gee has always been committed to a literary life, a life of the mind, Gee's point in her autobiography is that one cannot deny one's animal influences. The memoir is a record of how these animal influences: birth, sex, love, death, have shaped her life. This is also an autobiography about class. Gee came of age at a time when the British class system was being overhauled, and working-class children could first aspire to an upper-class education. I enjoy autobiographies because I like to see how people make sense of their lives. This one offers an interesting look at the publishing industry, and at the demands of writing. It likewise provides a look at growing up with a difficult and demanding father. For all these things, there were times when I found my interest in the book flagging. Gee is rather liberal in offering advice, which I didn't necessarily need or want. There are also points at which reading about others' animal instincts ceases to be interesting. Most readers will gravitate towards this autobiography because of their interest in Gee's literary career, and those tend to be the best parts of the book. The appeal of this book comes from the fact that Gee is not merely an animal like everyone else, but a writer.
    • 4/5
      My Animal Life is a wide-ranging memoir, covering Maggie Gee's family background, post-war upbringing, and parts of her adult life, including writing, marriage and raising a daughter. Gee has an easy, discursive, highly visual style which makes the book a pleasure to read, and its short length keeps it from being terribly self-indulgent. For the most part, she knows what to say and when to stop. I particularly liked Gee's fair-mindedness: she doesn't want to write "misery mum" memoir, she says, so in recounting her difficult relationship with her father she makes an effort to understand him and ends up presenting a complicated but loving portrait. The chapters on writing and publishing her first novel, and dealing with the rejection of a later novel, are also fascinating for anyone interesting in reading, writing and the book world in general.
    • 1/5
      I requested this book because I especially like Maggie Gee's novel The White Family and was hoping to get some insight into her creative process. I was pleased that the goings-on surrounding that novel took up a good number of pages. I'd have like to have seen more of that about her other novels. After all, what makes Maggie Gee special, what makes her worthy of having a memoir published by a major press, is that she is an author. Much of the book, though, is made up of incidents we all share: love, family, school. Gee's experiences of these are not unusual, and the few points that are unusual are handled conventionally. Most of this book could be written by anybody who has had a relatively happy, successful, life. In part, that's her point: we're all alike, all animals, leading our animal lives. And because we're so similar and because she has been so successful professionally and personally, Gee wants to pass on her wisdom, writing, "still I am tempted to give advice. Still I believe I'm a bit of an expert" though she admits, "by middle-age people don't want gifts [of advice]." And so she gives into temptation and writes pages and pages of advice that cause Gee to come across as tiresome and smug. And yet she can't stop: "I persevere despite the boredom of my listener." Finally, 2/3 through the book Gee says, "And here I am still, running around the subject, avoiding the nub of the question I asked -- writing and [my daughter] Rosa: Rosa and writing: Before Rosa, writing. Why write? Why Rosa? . . . . I have been kicking up dust for several pages, unable to touch the heart of things." Don't get your hopes up, she never does examine those questions in any depth. Of course, the very fact of writing around those issues might be interesting, but I'm not Gee's therapist, I'm her reader. As a reader I look for the unusual, in narrative, perspective, or style and this book is full of the mundane. For me, this was a well-written, though boring book. I was relieved to finish it.
    • 4/5
      I went back and forth in my admiration for and dismissal of Maggie Gee's My Animal Life. I ended in admiration because her musings on her particular life do finally celebrate the universal, animal life that we all lead, the life filled with spirit and joy and tragedy and acceptance.We are nearly of an age, so I was never bored with reading intimate details of her life in England. She spends a good deal of time with her immediate family. Her father was abusive and angry, so that she grew up frightened. She knew, however, that both her parents loved her, and she has been able to acknowledge his gifts to her as well as the gifts from her beloved mother. She speaks of her husband and of her daughter, both of whom give her life joy and meaning. She speaks of her writing through which she channels the abundance of her life.This is all a great weight for one little book to carry, but I come away from it affirmed and even more grateful for my animal life. "I am alive at the time of writing this," she writes, "And so are you. --- The light is on, the eye open. Life! From nothing, we are ourselves, moving and breathing, here. Suddenly, this is our chance; our luck, our animal luck."
    • 4/5
      Maggie Gee's memoir would have been so much better if she had just stuck to writing about her life. Born to complex, imperfect parents who didn't always make the right decision, and living her twenties in the '60s, Gee has led an interesting life. She writes about her rather trying childhood and subsequent sexual rebellion in her early adulthood with the right amount of sarcasm and self-awareness, and I enjoyed the backstory into her parents' families as well. Where this book falls apart, however, is in Gee's desire to give the reader advice on various aspects of life. I don't look to an author to teach me how to raise children, or how to navigate the confusing world that is dating - I just want to read about his or her life. I can learn my life lessons on my own, thanks, and last I checked, writing novels does not give one an automatic degree in psychology or sociology. Also, Gee's overarching metaphor is that her life has been like an animal's, and that humans are really not that different from other living creatures. I get this, and it is an admirable stance to take, but I didn't need to be reminded of it on every single page. After a while, I found myself yelling "I get it!" at the pages of the book. Yes, animals deserve our respect. Yes, lots of life is about luck. Thanks tips.So, skim the sections where Gee dispenses her advice, especially the last chapter on souls, which is rather ridiculous, and just focus on her coming of age story. Actually, if you want a better exploration of life in the '60s, sexual freedom, and art, read Patti Smith's Just Kids
    • 4/5
      Class was an important factor in British education, work, and society just a few decades ago, and probably still is to a lesser extent. Maggie Gee describes how it impacted her choices and path in life. It is a captivating life story beginning in an era when attitudes and values were undergoing sweeping changes. Her memoir is not particularly exciting or stirring, but it is a brave, compelling mission in soul-searching. Her success as a writer is evident in the expressive style, making the story both interesting and entertaining. I commend Gee for being able to open her heart and write so frankly.