A Body, Undone

Living On after Great Pain

By: Christina Crosby

Narrated by: Christina Crosby

Length: 8 hrs and 28 mins

Publisher's summary

In the early evening on October 1, 2003, Christina Crosby was three miles into a 17-mile bicycle ride, intent on reaching her goal of 1,000 miles for the riding season. She was a respected senior professor of English who had celebrated her 50th birthday a month before. As she crested a hill, she caught a branch in the spokes of her bicycle, which instantly pitched her to the pavement. Her chin took the full force of the blow, and her head snapped back. In that instant, she was paralyzed.

In A Body, Undone, Crosby puts into words a broken body that seems beyond the reach of language and understanding. She writes about a body shot through with neurological pain, disoriented in time and space, incapacitated by paralysis and deadened sensation. To address this foreign body, she calls upon the readerly pleasures of narrative, critical feminist and queer thinking, and the concentrated language of lyric poetry. Working with these resources, she recalls her 1950s tomboy ways in small-town rural Pennsylvania, and records growing into the 1970s through radical feminism and the affirmations of gay liberation.

Deeply unsentimental, Crosby communicates in unflinching prose the experience of "diving into the wreck" of her body to acknowledge grief, and loss, but also to recognize the beauty, fragility, and dependencies of all human bodies. A memoir that is a meditation on disability, metaphor, gender, sex, and love, A Body, Undone is a compelling account of living on, as Crosby rebuilds her body and fashions a life through writing, memory, and desire.

©2016 New York University (P)2016 Audible, Inc.

Excellent

There’s no quick summary that will invite readers to understand the experience in this book. Just listen to it. What was my favorite part? Somehow there were passages of detail that helped me understand I could care for others more, yet I do not think the word empathy was used in this book.

Personally, some of the fun parts of the book were hearing about lesbian culture in the 70’s and 80’s. I also liked the stories honoring the perspective of the Anabaptists.

It would be really interesting to hear more about the good part of living the life of an academic.

There are moments when the physical description seems like a lot. At that moment, remember a people live lives with inner strength that cannot be rendered in words.

I’m going to recommend this book to several friends.

Thanks

Extraordinary writer

This is a story of heroism, though it's unlikely that C. Cosby would describe it that way. One can only imagine what you would do after such a harrowing accident and ensuing disability. But her wonderful partner, and extraordinary mind have helped her to live a life worth living in spite of extreme challenges. This is a great read, in that her writing talent makes what could be a truly depressing journey into one of authentic self reflection and an exploration of what life itself really is. Her forays into her past are less interesting than her present ruminations, but it's all part of the whole swirling journey to a modicum of acceptance. I am inspired to keep struggling with my disabilities rather than sink into self pity and depression. Thank you, C. Cosby.

Read about this book in the NYT. Glad I did

The New York Times had an article on Christina’s passing and her work on female studies. Her story is one of those that you cannot believe, very tragic and unfair. She died way too young as consequence of a bicycling accident. Yet, she kept her job, kept doing research and wrote this book exposing her demons, her anger and what she went through to handle it all.
I enjoyed it and I recommend it. She also describes how writing cures de soul. Just beautiful. Happy that even though she’s not with us on this side of things, her work keeps on living and giving 💖