Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? by Jeanette Winterson

Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? by Jeanette Winterson

In 1985 Jeanette Winterson's first novel, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, was published. It tells the story of a young girl adopted by Pentecostal parents. The girl is supposed to grow up and be a missionary. Instead she falls in love with a woman. Disaster. Written when Jeanette was only twenty-five, her novel went on to win the Whitbread First Novel award, become an international bestseller and inspire an award-winning BBC television adaptation. Oranges was semi-autobiographical. Mrs Winterson, a thwarted giantess, loomed over that novel and its author's life. When Jeanette finally left her home, at sixteen, because she was in love with a woman, Mrs Winterson asked her: why be happy when you could be normal? This book is the story of a life's work to find happiness. It is a book full of stories: about a girl locked out of her home, sitting on the doorstep all night; about a tyrant in place of a mother, who has two sets of false teeth and a revolver in the duster drawer, waiting for Armageddon; about growing up in an northern industrial town now changed beyond recognition, part of a community now vanished; about the Universe as a Cosmic Dustbin. It is the story of how the painful past Jeanette Winterson thought she had written over and repainted returned to haunt her later life, and sent her on a journey into madness and out again, in search of her real mother. It is also a book about other people's stories, showing how fiction and poetry can form a string of guiding lights, a life-raft which supports us when we are sinking. Funny, acute, fierce and celebratory, this is a tough-minded search for belonging, for love, an identity, a home, and a mother.

Unforgettable… It’s the best book I have ever read about the cost of growing up-- Daisy Goodwin * Sunday Times *
A searingly felt and expressed autobiography…Funny and profoundly hopeful – a tale of survival -- Kate Hamer * Metro *
This book is good, sensible, beautiful company… Try this -- A.L. Kennedy * Week *
Jeanette Winterson’s writing is poetic, emotive and beautiful * So Many Books So Little Time (blog) *
Incredibly moving and full of Winterson’s characteristic wit. * Elle *

Jeanette Winterson OBE was born in Manchester. Adopted by Pentecostal parents she was raised to be a missionary. This did and didn’t work out.

Discovering early the power of books she left home at 16 to live in a Mini and get on with her education. After graduating from Oxford University she worked for a while in the theatre and published her first novel at 25. Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit is based on her own upbringing but using herself as a fictional character. She scripted the novel into a BAFTA-winning BBC drama. 27 years later she re-visited that material in the bestselling memoir Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? She has written 10 novels for adults, as well as children’s books, non-fiction and screenplays. She writes regularly for the Guardian. She lives in the Cotswolds in a wood and in Spitalfields, London.

She believes that art is for everyone and it is her mission to prove it.

SKU	Non disponible
ISBN 13	9780224093453
ISBN 10	0224093452
Titre	Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?
Auteur	Jeanette Winterson
État	Non disponible
Type de reliure	Hardback
Éditeur	Vintage Publishing
Année de publication	2011-10-27
Nombre de pages	240
Note de couverture	La photo du livre est présentée à titre d'illustration uniquement. La reliure, la couverture ou l'édition réelle peuvent varier.
Note	Non disponible