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A History of My Brief Body
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
15 posts | 13 read | 14 to read
The youngest ever winner of the Griffin Prize mines his own personal history to reconcile the world he was born into with the world that could be. Billy-Ray Belcourt's debut memoir opens with a tender letter to his kokum and memories of his early life in the hamlet of Joussard, Alberta, and on the Driftpile First Nation. From there, it expands to encompass the big and broken world around him, in all its complexity and contradictions: a legacy of colonial violence and the joy that flourishes in spite of it, first loves and first loves lost, sexual exploration and intimacy, and the act of writing as a survival instinct and a way to grieve. What emerges is not only a profound meditation on memory, gender, anger, shame, and ecstasy, but also the outline of a way forward. With startling honesty, and in a voice distinctly and assuredly his own, Belcourt situates his life experiences within a constellation of seminal queer texts, among which this book is sure to earn its place. Eye-opening, intensely emotional, and excessively quotable, A History of My Brief Body demonstrates over and over again the power of words to both devastate and console us.
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Robotswithpersonality
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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A galvanizing series of essays that blur the line between memoir and think piece. The author is palpably a poet, in that I struggled to adapt to his gorgeously complex phrasing, but found it all the more affecting and informative for not coddling the reader. 1/?

Robotswithpersonality It is heartening to see Belcourt push towards a future of creative joy, while consistently elucidating all the ways in which the Canada of the past and present hampers the possibility of such a life experience for Indigenous people. Discussions of life as a queer man of colour likewise indicates the striving for love and the social and structural impediments to finding it. 2/? 14mo
Robotswithpersonality It is enjoyable to see a writer frequently touch on a sentence or two written by others, you get this sense of collaborative inspiration, of sharing ideas, when otherwise I worry that writing is isolating, in the search for a 'pure' inspiration not to be intermingled with words that might be claimed by another.
I think it's because I usually see it in research/journalistic non-fiction, seeing citation/quotes in a memoir provides hope of a full life, reading and discussion between fellow writers. 3/?
14mo
Robotswithpersonality As with other non-fiction personal works written by Black,
Indigenous and people of colour I have encountered as a
white reader, I am reminded that reading alone will not
suffice. Action must be taken, so that the liveable future so many minorities have long been fighting for and creating art to encourage into existence may become a reality, via the restructure of systems, (as well as hearts and minds), long incapable and seemingly uncaring, of meeting all citizens' needs.

▲ Suicidal ideation, suicide, homophobia, racism, hate crimes 4/4
14mo
6 likes3 comments
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shawnmooney
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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https://youtu.be/cWBiPCuJjXE

#SkodenReadathon
#ernauxvember

Intro

Highlights

A History of My Brief Body by Billy-Ray Belcourt

Caprice by Ronald Firbank

All About H. Hatterr by G.V. Desani

The Strangers by Katherena Vermette

The Uncle's Story by Witi Ihimaera

Happening by Annie Ernaux, Tanya Leslie (Translator)

KimM I've never ready Belcourt but I was given A Minor Chorus and it looks interesting. 1y
24 likes1 comment
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shawnmooney
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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Soubhiville That‘s beautiful. 1y
29 likes1 comment
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TheKidUpstairs
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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"From nowhere but the graveyard of history could someone marshal the cruelty of denying someone the solidity of everyday life."

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CaseyTheCanadianLesbrarian
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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"A long tradition of brutality and negligence is what constitutes kinship for the citizens of a nation sat atop the lands of older, more storied ones. I can't promise I won't become snared in someone's lethal mythology of race. What I can do is love as though it will rupture the singularity of Canadian cruelty."

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MsLeah8417
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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January 2021 Wrap Up

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xicanti
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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I switched from my unsatisfying faux-South American novel to Billy-Ray Belcourt‘s memoir, and it‘s the best choice I‘ve made all month. This book is amazing so far.

Also excellent: grilled cheese on cheese bread with a puddle of HP sauce.

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MsLeah8417
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt

Currently listening to...

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Augustdana
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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Heard good things about this one! Just in from my beloved library.

10 likes1 stack add
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Lindy
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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In emotionally intense vignettes, Belcourt documents his first 25 years as a gay Nêhiyaw individual reaching for the poetIc possibilities in life. These essays focus on his self-reinvention after leaving his northern Alberta reserve to attend university & subsequently earn a PhD in English. Belcourt writes about finding joy, connections & purpose, despite the racism in Canadian society. An erudite #audiobook read by the author. #Indigenous #LGBTQ

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Lindy
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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The creative drive, the artistic impulse, is above all a thunderous yes to life.

Cathythoughts Yes !!! ❤️ 3y
38 likes1 stack add1 comment
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Thndrstd
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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Billy-Ray Belcourt is from the Driftpile Cree Nation in Canada, a lauded poet, and an academic. His work is about being indigenous and gay. He uses the term NDN for "Indian" and this beautifully written memoir/meditation describes the challenges of his life and his identity. He brings both the poetic and academic into his analysis of his own life and sexuality. At times, difficult to read but important, intimate portrait. Highly recommended.

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ReadingEnvy
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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"Desirous of a beautiful life I get out of bed, but it's Monday and I'm in the throes of a genocide. I make a cup of coffee and pick up a poetry collection, both of which I attend to at my living room window; for a few minutes, I think of nothing besides coffee, poetry, and windows, which feels like a small rebellion... I'm not in the future. I'm in the present; this means I'm as lonely and as brief as a country."

ReadingEnvy Billy-Ray is in conversation with so many others in this book - it brought to mind The Argonaut by Maggie Nelson in the way it connects to other thinkers and their words (and in fact he does mention Nelson at least once) and weaves together literary criticism and art criticism level thinking (ie: scholarly) with poetry and with his own experiences as a gay man, an "NDN," and more. Gorgeous, I need to go back to his earlier work as well.
4y
34 likes2 stack adds1 comment
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Bookalong
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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5🌟A magnificent memoir of queer sexuality and intimacy, of the impacts of intergenerational traumas towards Indigenous peoples, of grief and survival.This slim book is a powerhouse of intelligent, beautiful brutally honesty writing. A perfect mix of poetry and philosophy. Of Canada's racist history and colonialism, an exploration of queer sexuality, of trauma, grief, love, sex, and so much more. All through the eyes of a true poet!

11 likes1 stack add
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candority
A History of My Brief Body | Billy-Ray Belcourt
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I‘m not in the right headspace to give this book the attention it needs. In the preface addressed to his Nôhkom, Belcourt writes “It‘s likely that you might feel confused at times by my style of writing, its dexterity, its refusal of easiness,” and that is certainly true for me. I don‘t want to review the book unfairly, simply because his message went over my head. I love his poetry collections and I‘m sure this is just as powerful.?

candority I‘ve decided to DNF it, but not mark it as a review, because I don‘t want to unfairly impact the score on Litsy. I‘m sure others will love it. #doublespin #netgalley 4y
TheAromaofBooks Sounds like a fair assessment. Not every book is for every person - and not every book that's for you is for you all the time, if that makes sense!! This one may speak to you at a different season. 4y
candority @TheAromaofBooks That absolutely makes sense! I‘ll definitely give it another go later on 😊 4y
67 likes3 comments