Synopses & Reviews
“I know I’m not a man...and I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m probably not a woman, either....The trouble is, we’re living in a world that insists we be one or the other.” With these words, Kate Bornstein ushers readers on a funny, fearless, and wonderfully scenic journey across the terrains of gender and identity. On one level,
Gender Outlaw details Bornstein’s transformation from heterosexual male to lesbian woman, from a one-time IBM salesperson to a playwright and performance artist. But this particular coming-of-age story is also a provocative investigation into our notions of male and female, from a self-described nonbinary transfeminine diesel femme dyke who never stops questioning our cultural assumptions.
Gender Outlaw was decades ahead of its time when it was first published in 1994. Now, some twenty-odd years later, this book stands as both a classic and a still-revolutionary work — one that continues to push us gently but profoundly to the furthest borders of the gender frontier.
With a new introduction.
Review
“[Bornstein offers us] an abundance of questions — thoughtful, disarming, revelatory questions. Gender Outlaw is an invitation to a dialogue, and it’s a conversation well worth having.” Ms.
Review
“Gender Outlaw is an eye-opening book, combining the emotional force of a coming-of-age story with a savvy cultural critique.” Out
Review
“[Bornstein is on the] leading edge of contemporary debate about sexual identity and gender. [She] asks fundamental and challenging questions about what it means to be a man or woman in our society.” San Francisco Chronicle
About the Author
Kate Bornstein is an author, playwright and performance artist. Kate's plays and performance pieces include Strangers in Paradox, Hidden: A Gender, The Opposite Sex Is Neither, Virtually Yours, and y2kate: gender virus 2000. Kate's books are taught in over 120 colleges and universities around the world, and ze has performed hir work live on college campuses as well as in theaters and performance spaces across the USA, in Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Austria. Kate lives in New York, NY.