Product Description

The writer Jan Morris has led an extraordinary life. Perhaps her most remarkable work is this honest account of her ten-year transition from man to woman - its pains and joys, its frustrations and discoveries.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #154367 in Books
• Published on: 2002-04-08
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 160 pages

Times Literary Supplement, 17 May 2002
A perfectly formed work of art, achieving the state of grace to which its creator so elegantly aspires.

The Times, 30 March 2002
In a new introduction, Morris describes the book as a period piece. She does herself and injustice. It is a classic.

Observer, 24 March 2002
Writing about her self, a place she has explored profoundly, she achieves inspired reportage and a courageous self-analysis.

Customer Reviews

MAN ENOUGH TO BE A WOMAN...
This is an intriguing memoir, beautifully written by an author who has written numerous other non-fiction books. Jan Morris, formerly known as James Morris, was the correspondent for the London Times assigned to cover England's historic summit of Everest. The author actually accompanied the expedition to the Himalayas and did on site dispatches of the historic event. It would be as James Morris that she would write the wonderful book, "Coronation Everest", which chronicles the events leading to the historic summit of Everest by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay on the eve of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. The author would eventually become a celebrated writer of many travel books, journeying the world over.

This very personal book is an autobiographical narrative of the author's own gender dysphoria, as she, a biological male at birth, had always felt that she had been born into the wrong body. Elegantly written, it is not a book for those who are seeking tabloid sensationalism. Rather, it is, at times, somewhat anachronistic in feel, as it was written by someone who lived through a time when actual gender changes were still in the nascent stages. Passing historical references are made to those transsexuals who paved the way for others.

The author's account of her early life is fascinating, as much of it was spent in traditional male pursuits of the time. A stint in the army as a member of the 9th Queen's Royal Lancers, years as a well-known foreign correspondent, as well as husband and father, were all roles in which the author found some satisfaction but never total fulfillment, as her gender dysphoria continually intruded upon her happiness, a dark cloud hovering over all that she did and all that she was.

The author's recollection of her lifelong, personal conundrum over gender is graced with self-deprecating wit and humor. It is a first rate autobiographical account of the author's journey across the shivering sands of gender dysphoria. Born in 1927, the author, with the support of Elizabeth, her wife and best friend, crossed the gender frontier at the age of forty five, after having spent thirty-five years as a male and ten additional years in androgynous transition as a hormonal chimera.

It was with her surgery in a clinic in Casablanca in 1972 that the author felt that she finally was able to live her life as she was meant to live it. Her account of her surgery, however, is enough to make one take pause at the sheer desperation to reconcile one's inner self with one's outer self. Still, notwithstanding the seemingly primitive approach of the clinic to such a complex surgery, James Morris crossed the gender frontier and surgically metamorphosed into the woman that she had always felt herself to be, surmounting the last hurdle to self-realization. Thus, Jan Morris was born.

This is an extremely literate account of a very personal journey by a gender dysphoric individual. It is a beautifully realized book that is sure to become a classic in its genre. Bravo!

Helped with my own decision
Transsexual biographies are a mixed bunch. Jan Morris's Conundrum is one of the few by a really good writer. Much of what she said resonated with my own experience of gender dysphoria and reading her book helped me through my own sex change.