While I procrastinate the immense amount of online work required of me, I thought I’d write a review and procrastinate productively! I haven’t finished it yet, but I’ve been loving In the Darkroom by Susan Faludi, a memoir chronicling the author’s exploration of her father’s identity in the aftermath of her father’s transition from male to female. Stefanie Faludi, formerly Steven, grew up in Budapest Hungary, the only son of a wealthy Jewish couple. He survives the Holocaust, ending up in America working as a successful photo manipulator for Conde Nast, engineering a stereotypical American family life that eventual falls apart in divorce and violence, leading to his return to Hungary. After gender confirmation surgery at 76, Stefanie’s daughter, the author, visits and interviews her, piecing together a multifaceted identity and attempting to understand the causes for this massive change and past actions. The book certainly discusses gender identity, but looks at identity as influenced by many spheres of life: culture, religion, nationality, persecution etc. The Holocaust cannot be the sole reason for Stephanie’s transition, but Faludi’s examination of the the experience of Hungarian Jews and the history of Hungary’s fragmented identity provides background to the desire to reinvent and kill a former identity. With an already intriguing premise Faludi builds it into a detailed analysis of her father and a more macro understanding of identity.
Request the ebook from the Brooklyn Public Library after I'm finished with it!
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