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The baby on the fire escape : creativity, motherhood, and the mind-baby problem / Julie Phillips.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: New York, NY : W.W. Norton & Company, [2022]Edition: First editionDescription: 310 pages : illustrations ; 24 cmContent type:
  • text
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 9780393088595
  • 0393088596
Subject(s):
Contents:
The Mind-Baby Problem -- "The Presiding Genius of Her Own Body" -- Outlaw Mothering: Alice Neel (1900-1984) -- All the Time: Art Monsters and Maintenance Work -- The Discomfort Zone: Sex and Love -- Incompatible Pleasures: Doris Lessing (1919-2013) -- The Discomfort Zone: The Unavailable Muse -- "Poems Are Housework": Books versus Babies -- All Happy Families: Ursula K. Le Guin (1929-2018) -- The Discomfort Zone: Ghosts -- The Discomfort Zone: Late Success -- Mother, Poet, Warrior: Audre Lorde (1934-1992) -- The Discomfort Zone: Not Being All There -- Freedom: Alice Walker (1944-) -- The Baby on the Writing Desk; or, Two Things at Once -- Her Own Version: Angela Carter (1940-1992) -- Time and the Story.
Summary: "An insightful and provocative exploration of the relationship between motherhood and art through the lives of women artists and writers. What does it mean to create, not in "a room of one's own," but in a domestic space? Do children and genius rule each other out? In The Baby on the Fire Escape, award-winning biographer Julie Phillips traverses the shifting terrain where motherhood and creativity converge. With fierce empathy and vivid prose, Phillips evokes the intimate struggles of brilliant artists and writers, including Doris Lessing, who had to choose between her motherhood and herself; Ursula K. Le Guin, who found productive stability in family life; Audre Lorde, whose queer, polyamorous union allowed her to raise children on her own terms; and Alice Neel, who once, to finish a painting, was said to have left her baby on the fire escape of her New York apartment. A meditation on maternal identity and artistic greatness, The Baby on the Fire Escape illuminates some of the most pressing conflicts in contemporary women's lives"-- Provided by publisher.
Holdings
Item type Home library Collection Call number Materials specified Status Date due Barcode Item holds
Adult Book Adult Book Main Library NonFiction 810.9352 P561 Available 33111010835995
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

What does a great artist who is also a mother look like? What does it mean to create, not in "a room of one's own," but in a domestic space? In The Baby on the Fire Escape, award-winning biographer Julie Phillips traverses the shifting terrain where motherhood and creativity converge.

With fierce empathy, Phillips evokes the intimate and varied struggles of brilliant artists and writers of the twentieth century. Ursula K. Le Guin found productive stability in family life, and Audre Lorde's queer, polyamorous union allowed her to raise children on her own terms. Susan Sontag became a mother at nineteen, Angela Carter at forty-three. These mothers had one child, or five, or seven. They worked in a studio, in the kitchen, in the car, on the bed, at a desk, with a baby carrier beside them. They faced judgement for pursuing their creative work--Doris Lessing was said to have abandoned her children, and Alice Neel's in-laws falsely claimed that she once, to finish a painting, left her baby on the fire escape of her New York apartment.

As she threads together vivid portraits of these pathbreaking women, Phillips argues that creative motherhood is a question of keeping the baby on that apocryphal fire escape: work and care held in a constantly renegotiated, provisional, productive tension. A meditation on maternal identity and artistic greatness, The Baby on the Fire Escape illuminates some of the most pressing conflicts in contemporary life.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 281-310).

The Mind-Baby Problem -- "The Presiding Genius of Her Own Body" -- Outlaw Mothering: Alice Neel (1900-1984) -- All the Time: Art Monsters and Maintenance Work -- The Discomfort Zone: Sex and Love -- Incompatible Pleasures: Doris Lessing (1919-2013) -- The Discomfort Zone: The Unavailable Muse -- "Poems Are Housework": Books versus Babies -- All Happy Families: Ursula K. Le Guin (1929-2018) -- The Discomfort Zone: Ghosts -- The Discomfort Zone: Late Success -- Mother, Poet, Warrior: Audre Lorde (1934-1992) -- The Discomfort Zone: Not Being All There -- Freedom: Alice Walker (1944-) -- The Baby on the Writing Desk; or, Two Things at Once -- Her Own Version: Angela Carter (1940-1992) -- Time and the Story.

"An insightful and provocative exploration of the relationship between motherhood and art through the lives of women artists and writers. What does it mean to create, not in "a room of one's own," but in a domestic space? Do children and genius rule each other out? In The Baby on the Fire Escape, award-winning biographer Julie Phillips traverses the shifting terrain where motherhood and creativity converge. With fierce empathy and vivid prose, Phillips evokes the intimate struggles of brilliant artists and writers, including Doris Lessing, who had to choose between her motherhood and herself; Ursula K. Le Guin, who found productive stability in family life; Audre Lorde, whose queer, polyamorous union allowed her to raise children on her own terms; and Alice Neel, who once, to finish a painting, was said to have left her baby on the fire escape of her New York apartment. A meditation on maternal identity and artistic greatness, The Baby on the Fire Escape illuminates some of the most pressing conflicts in contemporary women's lives"-- Provided by publisher.

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