Dress Codes: Of Three Girlhoods--My Mother's， My Father's， and Mine

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价格:132.00

isbn号码:9780312422585

具体描述

Amazon.com If the only time you think you've seen a transsexual is on the Jerry Springer show， Noelle Howey's thoughtful， funny memoir of her suburban childhood with a cross-dressing dad may leave you wondering where all the fireworks are. The first half of Dress Codes is like anyone's story of parental neglect. "I had a dad possibly like yours，" Howey explains， "sullen， sporadically hostile， frequently vacant." It was her loving mother who eventually confided her father's secret when Howey was 15， by which time it came as a relief that the remoteness， the drinking， the mood swings were not the young Noelle's fault， but the result of her father's constantly stifled "yearning for angora." Although the early chapters are interesting， Dress Codes really takes off at the halfway point， when her father realized he was not a heterosexual male transvestite， but a woman. His sexual transition， and the family's awkward adjustment to it--including the author's inability in high school to keep any secret aside from this One Big Secret--is written with warmth and insight， and colored with a lonely girl's lingering disappointment. --Regina Marler --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. From Publishers Weekly In this rich memoir， Howey details not one life， but three. It's a difficult juggling act， but it pays off beautifully， for the story of her father's coming out as a male-to-female transsexual is only part of a larger narrative of growing up female in America. Howey's writing is neither sensationalistic nor condescendingly cheery; this is a loving portrait of a girl's complicated relationship to her father's femininity and her own. The author， co-editor of Out of the Ordinary: Essays on Growing Up with Gay， Lesbian and Transgender Parents， nicely juxtaposes her childhood dress-up games and clandestine sexual experimentation (she wanted to be Madonna) with her father's secret penchant for soft scarves and pumps (he dreamed of becoming Annette Funicello). As a teenager， Howey was impatient with the attention that her father's adventures always garnered and told her parents， both of whom she enjoyed a healthy relationship with， about her sex life: "It was a power maneuver on my part.... Dad kept raising the bar of what Mom and I could accept with equanimity， and I felt justified in doing the same." She is no less forthcoming about the odd celebrity status having a transsexual parent granted her at her ultra-liberal college， elevating her "above all the other upper-middle-class white chicks in thrift wear roaming the commons." Howey's candid， funny writing gives this memoir the cast of fiction， perhaps not surprising in a book honest enough to admit "we all reconstruct our lives in reverse， altering our own anecdotes and stories year after year in order to make them more congruent with our present-day selves." Agent， Karen Gerwin. (May)Forecast: Sure， there are lots of books out there on families with transgendered parents. But how many are memoirs? And how many are as funny and candid as this one? Howey's work will do splendidly.Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information， Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. See all Editorial Reviews

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这是一部需要耐心去品味的文学作品，它拒绝给出简单的答案，而是抛出了一系列复杂的问题。作者高超的叙事技巧在于，她成功地将个人的、微观的成长经历，嵌入到宏大的社会变迁和文化思潮之中，形成了一种清晰的对照。我感受到了强烈的时代错位感——母亲在二战后的节制与我自己在数字时代的过度暴露之间，那种“规范”的形式变了，但其内核的压迫性似乎从未真正消亡。这种洞察力，使得这本书具有超越性别的普适价值。它让我们反思，我们今天所引以为傲的“自由选择”，是否只是被重新包装过的、更难以察觉的“着装规范”？阅读过程像是一场深刻的考古发掘，挖掘出关于自我认同的深层根基。最终，它留下的是一种清醒的认知：身份的构建，永远是一场与外部世界持续协商的过程。

这本书的结构处理简直是天才之作，完全颠覆了我对非虚构文学的既有认知。作者没有采用线性叙事，而是像一位技艺高超的织工，将三条看似独立却又彼此纠缠的生命线——她母亲、她父亲（这里的“父亲”身份的引入本身就极具颠覆性，暗示了性别光谱的复杂性）以及她自己——编织在一起。这种跳跃感和多声部叙事，成功地避免了传统回忆录的沉闷感。我尤其欣赏作者在描述那些被压抑的瞬间时，所采用的克制而精准的语言。那种“未说出口的话”的重量，往往比直接的控诉更具穿透力。它不像那些激昂的社会评论，反而像是一份私密的、充满褶皱的日记，邀请你潜入其中，感受那些微妙的权力运作和身份认同的碎片。读完后，我感觉自己像是参与了一场漫长的、关于“我是谁，我被期望成为谁”的哲学辩论。每一次翻页，都像是在打开一个全新的时间胶囊，充满了既熟悉又陌生的社会学洞察。

这部作品给我带来的震撼是多层次的。它不仅仅是一部关于成长和家庭历史的回忆录，更像是一张由时间、性别和身份交织而成的精美挂毯。作者以一种近乎解剖学的细致，剖析了三代女性（或更准确地说，是“女孩身份”）在不同社会规范下所经历的无声束缚与挣扎。我特别欣赏作者在处理“着装规范”（Dress Codes）这个核心隐喻时的巧妙。它远超出了字面意义上的衣物选择，而是深入到社会对女性行为、期望甚至内心世界的隐性编码。读着母亲那一代人在战后环境下的谨小慎微，与作者本人在当代文化冲突中的迷茫，那种跨越时代的共鸣感让人难以言喻。那种试图在既定框架内寻找呼吸空间的努力，那种对“被允许成为什么样的人”的持续追问，是整本书最引人入胜的核心。叙事节奏时而如潺潺溪流般温和，时而又如同骤然爆发的雷雨，让人在情绪的过山车中体会到历史的厚重感。这本书迫使读者停下来，审视自己身上那些不自觉遵循的“规范”，无疑是一次深刻的自我反思之旅。

这本书的文笔，如果用一个词来形容，那就是“冷峻的诗意”。它既有学院派思辨的严谨逻辑，又时不时地闪现出令人惊艳的文学光芒。作者似乎深谙如何用最简洁的笔触勾勒出最复杂的心理状态。例如，她对某些特定历史时期服装材质的描述，立刻就能将读者带入那种特定时代的物理感和心理压抑感之中。这种感官上的丰富性，让阅读体验变得极其立体。我尤其喜欢她探讨“沉默”的艺术。三代女性在面对社会期待时，或选择顺从、或选择抵抗、或选择模糊，但最终，她们都以各自的方式，为“着装规范”付出了某种代价。这种对女性“隐形劳动”的致敬与审视，使得全书的基调既忧郁又充满力量。它不是那种让你读完后立刻想大喊口号的作品，而是一种缓慢渗透、在你内心深处留下深刻印记的体验。

坦白说，我原本以为这会是一部略显沉闷的家族史，但事实恰恰相反，它充满了令人不安的张力。作者在构建她与父母关系时的坦诚度令人印象深刻。她似乎毫不畏惧地撕开那些被精心修饰过的家庭神话，直面那些潜在的矛盾和未解的情绪债务。这种“去美化”的处理方式，使得人物形象异常饱满和真实，而非扁平化的符号。特别是关于“父亲的女孩身份”这一章节，其处理方式极其微妙，展现了父权社会下，即使是男性，也必须扮演某种“规范”的表演者。这种对性别角色刻板印象的深度解构，是这本书远超一般回忆录价值的地方。它探讨的不是简单的“叛逆”，而是关于“适应”与“异化”之间的永恒拉锯战。阅读过程中，我多次因为某些情节的精确描绘而屏住呼吸，仿佛自己也成了那个在特定场合、穿着不合时宜的衣服、进行着不符合预期的行为的局外人。