The Autobiography of a Face
Title: Autobiography of a Face
Author: Lucy Grealy
Type of Text: Autobiography (Female Author, Non-Fiction)
Date Completed: 29 April 2013
Autobiography of a Face, by Lucy Grealy, is her story about the misfortune of having a third of her jaw removed and the cruel reality that followed. At age nine, Lucy Grealy was diagnosed with a potentially terminal cancer. When she returned to school with a third of her jaw removed, she faced the cruel taunts of her peers. Vividly portraying the pain of peer rejection and the guilty pleasures of wanting to be special, Grealy captured what it is like as a child and young adult to be torn between two conflicting impulses: to feel that more than anything else we want to be loved for who we are, while wishing desperately and secretly to be perfect. This story made me wonder deeply about the ultimate beauty in our world.
I first was amazed at the physical pains the author had to go through throughout her childhood and adulthood. Not only did she have intensive chemotherapy for two and a half years, she had to be the "guinea pig" for the doctors wanting to try different types of skin graft on her jaw. Overall, Grealy beat cancer with only a one-in-twenty chance of survival, and endured more than thirty operations to reconstruct her jaw. Grealy described her first experience with chemotherapy as her body "wanting to turn itself inside out, making wave after wave of attempts to rid itself of this overwhelming and noxious poison." This event was a significant turning point for her story as from then on, she slowly realised she wasn't quite the same anymore. Looking at the event from a third person's view, I felt sorry for the young Grealy, who was oblivious to the challenging road of life mapped out in front of her. She was ignorant of the pitying looks people gave her because of her face, and was remarkably positive. Perhaps the fact that her parents never told her she had cancer kept Grealy out of self-hatred: "Someone dated
Author: Lucy Grealy
Type of Text: Autobiography (Female Author, Non-Fiction)
Date Completed: 29 April 2013
Autobiography of a Face, by Lucy Grealy, is her story about the misfortune of having a third of her jaw removed and the cruel reality that followed. At age nine, Lucy Grealy was diagnosed with a potentially terminal cancer. When she returned to school with a third of her jaw removed, she faced the cruel taunts of her peers. Vividly portraying the pain of peer rejection and the guilty pleasures of wanting to be special, Grealy captured what it is like as a child and young adult to be torn between two conflicting impulses: to feel that more than anything else we want to be loved for who we are, while wishing desperately and secretly to be perfect. This story made me wonder deeply about the ultimate beauty in our world.
I first was amazed at the physical pains the author had to go through throughout her childhood and adulthood. Not only did she have intensive chemotherapy for two and a half years, she had to be the "guinea pig" for the doctors wanting to try different types of skin graft on her jaw. Overall, Grealy beat cancer with only a one-in-twenty chance of survival, and endured more than thirty operations to reconstruct her jaw. Grealy described her first experience with chemotherapy as her body "wanting to turn itself inside out, making wave after wave of attempts to rid itself of this overwhelming and noxious poison." This event was a significant turning point for her story as from then on, she slowly realised she wasn't quite the same anymore. Looking at the event from a third person's view, I felt sorry for the young Grealy, who was oblivious to the challenging road of life mapped out in front of her. She was ignorant of the pitying looks people gave her because of her face, and was remarkably positive. Perhaps the fact that her parents never told her she had cancer kept Grealy out of self-hatred: "Someone dated