Les Femmes

'I defy you to read this book and come away with a mind unchanged' John Jeremiah Sullivan<BR>'Als has a serious claim to be regarded as the next James Baldwin' Observer<BR><BR>'I see how we are all the same, that none of us are white women or black men; rather, we're a series of mouths, and that every mouth needs filling: with something wet or dry, like love, or unfamiliar and savory, like love'<BR><BR>White Girls is about, among other things, blackness, queerness, movies, Brooklyn, love (and the loss of love), AIDS, fashion, Basquiat, Capote, philosophy, porn, Louise Brooks and Michael Jackson. Freewheeling and dazzling, tender and true, it is one of the most highly acclaimed essay collections in years. <BR><BR>'A voice that's new, that comes as if from a different room. I defy you to read this book and come away with a mind unchanged' John Jeremiah Sullivan, author of Pulphead <BR><BR>'Effortless, honest and fearless' Rich Benjamin, The New York Times<BR><BR>'Als is one of the most consistently unpredictable and surprising essayists out there, an author who confounds our expectations virtually every time he writes' David L. Ulin, Los Angeles Times<BR><BR> 'A comprehensive and utterly lovely collection of one of the best writers around' Eugenia Williamson, Boston Globe

'Magical ... truly original ... Writing of people who limited themselves and died of it, Als has overcome limits' The New York Times Book Review <BR><BR>What are the forces that shape us? Hilton Als's brilliant, now-classic meditation on gender, race and personal identity in America<BR><BR>In The Women, Hilton Als explores-with breath taking originality-the role of sexual and racial identity in marginalized lives. With a blend of fact and fiction, Als brings to vivid life a number of extraordinary characters, including: his mother, a singular woman whose West Indian heritage and determination inspired her son to write; Malcolm X's mother, whose mixed-race background and eventual descent into madness contributed to her son's burgeoning misogyny and fear; brilliant, Harvard-educated Dorothy Dean, who deeply empathized with white gay men; and Owen Dodson, teacher and poet, who played an important role in the author's development as a gay man, and thinker.<BR><BR>Combining memoir, cultural history, social theory and storytelling, The Women is a profoundly innovative work which has inspired a generation of writers. Here, Als submits both racial and sexual stereotypes to scrutiny, showing 'no mercy but every tenderness'. The results are exhilarating. The Women is that rarest of books: a memorable work of self-investigation that creates a form of all its own.