Autobiography Of A Face Exploration Of Health...

Autobiography of a Face: Exploration of Health Communication Concepts Kara Martin University of South Dakota Over the years I have observed that it is not uncommon for people to judge others based upon standards in our society which are imposed upon us through the media via television, movies, celebrities, magazines, and music. Autobiography of a Face, is a memoir written and narrated by the late poet Lucy Grealy and was published in 1994. This book followed Lucy beginning at the age of nine when she was first diagnosed with a rare type of cancer located in her jaw called Ewing’s Sarcoma. Lucy’s story chronicled her struggle with her self-identity after surviving childhood cancer. A facial disfigurement that†¦show more content†¦Rather than simply compose a story that heroically depicted her battle with cancer, Lucy added authenticity and depth to her novel with themes that revealed her struggle to â€Å"fit in†, to cope with the pain of loneliness, of feeling lost within her own family, of enduring illness with stoicism, and to somehow find happiness in the af termath of illness. This book report will examine how Lucy’s story metamorphosed from an examination of her childhood experiences with cancer into a search for her own identity as an adult. The starting point where Lucy began telling her story in this novel was significant. Lucy delved in to describe a happy time in her life when she was working as a teenager with horses and children at the Diamond D Stables. By this time, she had already persevered through several surgeries. Lucy was aware that her facial disfigurement often attracted unwanted attention from smaller children, parents, and others in the community. In her mind, she felt that she got the job at the stables because she did not attend a face-to-face interview. Instead, she used the telephone to inquire about the job and did not mention her appearance. This may have been Lucy’s first â€Å"real† job, but she was already suspicious that her appearance could have an undesirable effect on her ability t o get a job. Beginning her story at