Jang hanjin autobiography of a face

Home / Celebrity Biographies / Jang hanjin autobiography of a face

She writes, ``I felt as if my illness were a blanket the world had thrown over me.... She keeps hoping that facial reconstruction surgery will “fix” her appearance and that this will, in turn, “fix” her life. They face economic difficulties too. Still convinced that her “ugliness” means that she will never form a romantic relationship, she decides to try and move beyond the seemingly petty fixation on physical beauty to focus on higher, nobler forms of beauty instead.

More books than SparkNotes. Once a buoyant, sociable tomboy, Grealy, through her suffering, becomes isolated—finding human comfort mainly among the patients she meets in her numerous hospital stays.

Best summary PDF, themes, and quotes. And somehow I transformed that blanket into a tent, beneath which I almost happily set up camp.'' Still a young girl, she must cope not only with her own fear but with the awkwardly expressed fears of her parents as well.

An editor will review the submission and either publish your submission or provide feedback.

jang hanjin autobiography of a face

Her awareness of people staring at her face, her attempts to hide her face with her hair, and a feeling of joy on Halloween, when she could mask her face are heart-wrenching.

The book describes the impact of Lucy's disease on her family relationships. She teaches Lucy to 'be brave' and 'not to cry.' Lucy soon realizes the need to suppress her grief for the sake of her mother's wellbeing.

27, 1994

ISBN: 0-395-65780-6

Page Count: 256

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1994

Share your opinion of this book

.

She rebuilds her life with a remarkable combination of stoicism, wit, and dignity.

A strong debut.

Pub Date: Sept. Lucy belongs to an Irish immigrant family that copes with displacement.

Written by Ratna Bajpai

Grealy's memoir is a sensitive account of the relationship between physical appearance and self-esteem. However, several operations are unsuccessful and Lucy becomes convinced that she will never know love.

Throughout her struggle, Lucy finds solace in fantasies and in spending time with horses, creatures she values for their nobility and the fact that they do not judge her by her appearance.

She prefers the hospital to home because the hospital staff and patients expect nothing from her.

When Lucy grows up, she starts getting self-conscious about her appearance. Unfortunately, the skin grafts fail and leave her face permanently disfigured.

Finally, Lucy resolves to stop looking at the mirror. Through this, she learns how to accept herself and begin her life properly, with her new face and a new outlook.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FACE

A gracefully written account of one woman's physical and spiritual struggle to surmount childhood cancer, permanent disfigurement, and, ultimately, ``the deep bottomless grief...called ugliness.'' After surviving relentless medical horrors—the removal at age nine of half her jaw due to Ewing Sarcoma, two and a half years of chemotherapy, and two years of reconstructive surgery—Grealy's true battle begins when she looks in the mirror and finds herself trapped behind a face, in a ``self'' that she hates, and for which her peers cruelly punish her.

With these new friends, she feels accepted by other people for the first time in her life.

Despite these developments, Lucy still feels deeply unattractive and desperately wants to develop romantic and sexual relationships. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy.

Autobiography Of A Face

Published in 1994, Autobiography of a Face is award-winning poet Lucy Grealy’s prose debut, a widely-celebrated memoir concerning the author’s struggles with cancer and disfigurement.

At the age of 9, Lucy collides with a classmate during a game of dodgeball.

However, as the book draws to a close, she comes to terms with her life, begins questioning her understandings of physical beauty, and ultimately realizes that her issues have their roots in her low self-esteem and negative self-image. She is also shocked to learn that being beautiful has not solved all of the troubles in her life.

Now an award-winning poet and essayist (a short version of her tale originally appeared in Harper's and received a National Magazine Award), Grealy's tale ends not with magical deliverance, but with hard-won self-acceptance.