a book
Zami: A New Spelling of My Name
Audre Lorde · 1982 · 272 pages
Zami: A Carriacou name for women who work together as friends and lovers
“Zami is a fast-moving chronicle. From the author’s vivid childhood memories in Harlem to her coming of age in the late 1950s, the nature of Audre Lorde’s work is cyclical. It especially relates the linkage of women who have shaped her . . . Lorde brings into play her craft of lush description and characterization. It keeps unfolding page after page.”—Off Our Backs
“Among the elements that make the book so good are its personal honesty and lack of pretentiousness, characteristics that shine through the writing bespeaking the evolution of a strong and remarkable character.”—The New York Times
“Zami is a fast-moving chronicle. From the author’s vivid childhood memories in Harlem to her coming of age in the late 1950s, the nature of Audre Lorde’s work is cyclical. It especially relates the linkage of women who have shaped her . . . Lorde brings into play her craft of lush description and characterization. It keeps unfolding page after page.”—Off Our Backs
“Among the elements that make the book so good are its personal honesty and lack of pretentiousness, characteristics that shine through the writing bespeaking the evolution of a strong and remarkable character.”—The New York Times
recommended by 1 person
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Alison Bechdel
“I read this in my early 20s when I was voraciously devouring autobiographical books about lesbians and gay men. Lorde’s examination of her multiple outsiderness — black, female, queer, West Indian, poet — pried my sheltered mind wide open.”↗