Conundrum

Jan Morris

• Publisher: Faber & Faber
• Year: 2011
• eBook ISBN:
  9780571266005
• Subtopic: Travel

As one of Britain's best and most loved travel writers, Jan Morris has led an extraordinary life. Perhaps her most remarkable work is this grippingly honest account of her ten-year transition from man to woman - its pains and joys, its frustrations and discoveries. On first publication in 1974, the book generated enormous interest and curiosity around the world, and was subsequently chosen by The Times as one of the '100 Key Books of Our Time'. Including a new introduction, this re-issue marks a return to that particular journey.

'Certainly the best first-hand account ever written by a traveller across the boundaries of sex.' Daily Mail

Table of contents

• Cover
• Praise
• Title Page
• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• Introduction
• 1: Under the piano—above the sea—trans-sexuality—my conundrum
• 2: Living a falsehood—the nest of singing-birds—on Oxford —a small lump—in the cathedral—laughing
• 3: Sex and my conundrum—in the hayloft—gender and Bolsover Ma.
• 4: The colonel’s greeting—as to soldiering—impostor in the mess—Otto—non-persons
• 5: Identity—precedents of sorts—Dr. Benjamin—‘to alter the body!’
• 6: ‘Zero!’
• 7: Rescued—a grand love—objets d’art—the nightingale
• 8: Three employers—‘Anybody from the Guardian’—half a column—among the Egyptians—abhorrence
• 9: To Everest—the male brilliance—the male rhythm—a holy man
• 10: A trace of paranoia?—a bad world—no place for me
• 11: Pleasing my senses—the lust of Venice—the solace of Africa—sublimations
• 12: Changing sex—hormonal effects—a precarious condition—self-protection—rules
• 13: Oxford again—logistics—Jan—‘Come on in!’
• 14: Concerning surgery
• 15: Trefan—the last summer—on Welshness—to the magician
• 16: Casablanca—in the clinic—a stunning thought—made normal—Comrades!—new out of Africa
• 17: All for fun?—a manner suited—views of life—female sensations—forgetting
• 18: Problems still—ask a silly question—‘one is baffled’—regrets?
• 19: The human condition—speculations—under the piano still
• About the Author
• By the Same Author
• Copyright