Böcker av G. Thomas Couser

Examining the state of autobiography in the postmodern world, this volume demonstrates how writers use the experience of fragmentation to forge new kinds of collaborative identities. The essays examine a wide range of texts from narratives of suicide survivors to those of cross-dressers.

Having wounded his father with a devastating letter when he was twenty-three and felt somewhat responsible for his subsequent mental collapse, the author reexamines his father's life using documents found after his death to reflect on their relationship and reach a reconciliation with a man he had not really known.

Memoirs have enjoyed great popularity, experiencing significant sales, prominent reviews, and diverse readerships. This book shows that at the heart of the memoir phenomenon is our fascination with writing that focuses on what it means to live in, or be, an anomalous body - in other words, what it means to be disabled.

"My primary concern is with the ethics of representing vulnerable subjects-persons who are liable to exposure by someone with whom they are involved in an intimate or trust-based relationship, unable to represent themselves in writing, or unable to...