Publisher Description

[A] splendid collection . . . By turns wry, tender, pointed, and laugh-out-loud funny. Publishers Weekly Untangles the many truths about hair, and the lives we lead underneath it. Pamela Druckerman, author of Bringing Up Bebe Ask a woman about her hair, and she just might tell you the story of her life. Ask a whole bunch of women about their hair, and you could get a history of the world. Surprising, insightful, frequently funny, and always forthright, the essays in Me, My Hair, and I are reflections and revelations about every aspect of women s lives from family, race, religion, and motherhood to culture, health, politics, and sexuality. They take place in African American kitchens, at Hindu Bengali weddings, and inside Hasidic Jewish homes. The conversation is intimate and global at once. Layered into these reminiscences are tributes to influences throughout history: Jackie Kennedy, Lena Horne, Farrah Fawcett, the Grateful Dead, and Botticelli s Venus. The long and the short of it is that our hair is our glory and our nemesis, our history, our self-esteem, our joy, our mortality. Every woman knows that many things in life matter more than hair, but few bring as much pleasure as a really great hairdo.

Back Cover

Hair matters. And these writers go to great lengths to help us understand why. Adriana Trigiani on trendy hair: "I figure when Madonna gets scared about changing her hair, something is about to blow again, like Vesuvius." Marita Golden on black hair: "Black women's hair is knotted and gnarled byissues of race, politics, history, and pride." Anne Kreamer on going gray: "Much to my surprise, when I stopped coloring my hair, time began to slow down, in a good way." Maria Hinojosa on curly hair: "As I came to accept and even love my wild hair, it became a way for me to feel power that I had never experienced." Alex Kuczynski on waxing: "'Very beautiful.' I will never forget those words. I associate them with shock and vulnerability--and chafing." Deborah Feldman on covering hair: "Eventually I threw away my wigs. I abandoned the community that had forced me to wear them." Suleika Jaouad on lost hair: "Chemotherapy is a take-no-prisoners stylist." Patricia Volk on products: "High-functioning hair obsessives rarely go it alone. We have a team. The products, the people." "Untangles the many truths about hair, and the lives we lead underneath it." --Pamela Druckerman, author of Bringing Up B

Flap

Hair matters. And these writers go to great lengths to help us understand why. Adriana Trigiani on trendy hair: "I figure when Madonna gets scared about changing her hair, something is about to blow again, like Vesuvius." Marita Golden on black hair: "Black women's hair is knotted and gnarled byissues of race, politics, history, and pride." Anne Kreamer on going gray: "Much to my surprise, when I stopped coloring my hair, time began to slow down, in a good way." Maria Hinojosa on curly hair: "As I came to accept and even love my wild hair, it became a way for me to feel power that I had never experienced." Alex Kuczynski on waxing: "'Very beautiful.' I will never forget those words. I associate them with shock and vulnerability--and chafing." Deborah Feldman on covering hair: "Eventually I threw away my wigs. I abandoned the community that had forced me to wear them." Suleika Jaouad on lost hair: "Chemotherapy is a take-no-prisoners stylist." Patricia Volk on products: "High-functioning hair obsessives rarely go it alone. We have a team. The products, the people." "Untangles the many truths about hair, and the lives we lead underneath it." --Pamela Druckerman, author of Bringing Up B

Author Biography

Elizabeth Benedict is a graduate of Barnard College and the author of five novels, including the bestseller Almost and the National Book Award finalist Slow Dancing. She is the editor of the anthologies What My Mother Gave Me, a New York Times bestseller, and Mentors, Muses & Monsters, and has written for the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, Esquire, and the Huffington Post, the Rumpus, and Tin House. Two of her essays have been selected for Best American Essays collections. She has taught widely and works as a writing coach and editor.

Table of Contents

CONTENTS Acknowledgments xi Introduction xiii Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, The Rapunzel Complex 1 Suleika Jaouad, Hair, Interrupted 9 Marita Golden, My Black Hair 19 Anne Lamott, Sister 35 Patricia Volk, Frizzball 47 Alex Kuczynski, And Be Sure to Tell Your Mother 55 Rosie Schaap, Kozmic Hippie Hair Breakdown Blues 67 Bharati Mukherjee, Romance and Ritual 75 Emma Gilbey Keller, My Thick Hair 85 Adriana Trigiani, Oh Capello 95 Deborah Tannen, Why Mothers and Daughters Tangle over Hair 105 Honor Moore, Beautiful, Beautiful 117 Maria Hinojosa, My Wild Hair 131 Jane Green, Love at Last 139 Deborah Feldman, The Cutoff 147 Ru Freeman, Glory 157 Elizabeth Searle, Act Tresses: Hair as Performance Art 171 Hallie Ephron, Remembering Sandra Dee 185 Katie Hafner, Maids of the Mist 195 Deborah Jiang-Stein, Hair in Three Parts 205 Siri Hustvedt, Much Ado about Hairdos 215 Myra Goldberg, Two Hair Stories from One Life 231 Julia Fierro, Capelli Lunghi 243 Deborah Hofmann, Heavy Mettle 255 Jane Smiley, At Last, I Learn How to Turn Heads 269 Anne Kreamer, Getting Real 277 Elizabeth Benedict, No, I Won't Go Gray 287 Contributors 299

Review

"Truth and wisdom do such a delightful dance throughout "Me, My Hair, And I" that you finish the essay collection wondering why we don't spend more time, not less, obsessing over our tresses. . . A deliciously enlightening read, equal parts fun and poignant." --Chicago Tribune "This anthology of essays by women explores a surprising range of issues, including identity, relationships, vanity, femininity, aging, and society." --NYTimes.com "Here, in a series of astonishingly good essays, writers wax eloquent about the emotions wrought by our locks: 'good hair' and 'bad hair' in African-American culture; envy of our follicly gifted siblings; the quest for delusional hairstyles; and much more."--People
"Women show their roots in 'Me, My Hair, and I.'" --Vanity Fair "[T]hese twenty-seven essays are beautifully revelatory and deeply personal accounts of each woman's hair"--Bustle "The long and the short of it is that one of the most intimate--and fraught--relationships women have is with their hair . . . it's that relationship that's explored in Me, My Hair, and I, a collection of essays from a diverse range of authors . . . These essays are by turns funny and poignant. They will spark a sense of recognition in any woman who has ever suffered a bad hair day." --BUST Magazine
"Benedict has a knack for zeroing in on subjects with far-reaching, often surprising implications and resonance. In her third invitational collection, she has definitely tapped a nerve . . . Women spend enormous amounts of money and time on their hair, agonizing over every decision. Variations on these themes are tackled with candor, wit, insight, and emotion by Benedict's 27 eloquently entertaining contributors . . . [An] irresistible, pithy, and right-on anthology." --Booklist "[A] splendid collection . . . By turns wry, tender, pointed, and laugh-out-loud funny, the selections take us along on the contributors' tangled, complicated, and thoroughly engaging journeys."--Publishers Weekly "This collection is not only unique for the subject matter it addresses. It also provides cultural commentary that is by turns insightful, humorous, and moving. . . Surprisingly engaging reading." --Kirkus Reviews "We wear our hair every day, and this collection demonstrates--with great clarity and insight--the complexities of what that means for women of all backgrounds. An important conversation and worthy of note" --Library Journal

Promotional

These writers know that a woman's hair is her glory, her nemesis, her history, and her self-esteem. They know, too, that many things in life matter more than hair, but few bring as much pleasure as a really great hairdo.

Review Quote

"Untangles the many truths about hair, and the lives we lead underneath it." -- Pamela Druckerman, author of Bringing up B

Excerpt from Book

INTRODUCTION Ask a woman about her hair, and she just might tell you the story of her life. Ask a whole bunch of women, and if Me, My Hair, and I is any indication, you could get a history of the world: reflections and revelations about family, race, religion, ritual, culture, politics, celebrity, what goes on in African American kitchens and at Hindu Bengali weddings in Calcutta, alongside stories about the influence of Jackie Kennedy, Angela Davis, Lena Horne, Madonna, Audrey Hepburn, Shirley Temple, Sandra Dee, Joan Baez, Farrah Fawcett, Kelly McGillis, Judith Butler, the Grateful Dead, and Botticelli''s Venus. What''s abundantly clear in all these personal stories is that hair matters. Many other facts of life matter too, oftentimes more than hair (illness, poverty, war, famine, flood, and sometimes shoes and makeup), but hair can be counted on to matter just about every day, at least to a high percentage of women--and to more than a few men, at least back in the day. The Beatles'' long hair, when it first shimmied and shook on Th e Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, in time to "I Want to Hold Your Hand," changed the course of social history. Way before that, the Old Testament''s Samson believed that his hair, seven braids'' worth, was the source of his strength, and his enemies hired the temptress Delilah to cut if off. As I read and reflect on these essays, I''m struck by just how much hair matters to so many of us, and by the tangled intricacies of why. Why so much? And why with this intensity? "A woman''s hair is her glory," Maya Angelou explains in Good Hair , Chris Rock''s documentary about African American women and their hair. But long before it has a chance to acquire glory in our lives, it demands attention and care. It''s an early life lesson in basic grooming, a public window into the private household. In social science terms, hair is a signifier. One of the earliest signals it transmits, when we''re kids, is whether we are being looked after properly. A child''s unkempt hair invites scrutiny, condemnation, and, if it''s really a mess day after day, maybe a visit from Child Protective Services. As girls grow up and learn to groom their own hair, they learn to take care of themselves. When they have daughters, they groom them too, and so the cycle continues. Along the way, we learn that the hair choices we make for ourselves and others reveal who we are, the worlds we live in, and how we want to be perceived. For women, hair is an entire library of information, about status, class, self-image, desire, sexuality, values, and even mental health. For many of the years I lived in Washington, DC, in the 1980s, I remember frequently seeing a woman with gnarled, matted hair that stood a foot off her scalp. She was protesting--I think it was nuclear war--on the sidewalk outside the White House. While I shared her views on nuclear war, the state of her hair told me that she was not entirely well. I can summon her face vividly, but I know the reason I always noticed her was the house of hair atop her head. Hair matters because it''s always around , framing our faces, growing in, falling out, getting frizzy, changing colors--in short, demanding our attention: Comb me! Wash me! Relax me! Color me! It''s always there , conveying messages about who we are and what we want. Invite me to the prom! Love me! Hire me! Sleep with me! Don''t even think about sleeping with me! Take me seriously! Marry me! Mistake me--please!--for a much-younger woman! It''s always there, unless it''s gone or it''s hidden--and those absences tell stories too. A common one involves the ravages of chemotherapy; missing hair is evidence of illness. Then there are cultures where women shave off their hair and cover their heads, and other cultures where women may keep their hair, but their heads must be shrouded in veils, sometimes with only slits or screens through which to see. Why the shaved heads? Why the draperies? There are many reasons and many interpretations, depending on one''s relationship to the veils. Covering the hair signifies membership, to insiders and outsiders, in a specific group; it''s a quick self-identifier. It may remind members of the group how to worship and to behave. It focuses attention on the face, not the secondary characteristics. And shaving or hiding the hair fundamentally nullifies hair''s ornamental, aesthetic, and sexual properties, thereby sending unambiguous messages about the women''s availability and independence. Finally, there''s the hair that''s almost always hidden from view--but that has crept into public conversations in the past two decades, as Brazilian waxes, dyes, bleaches, and other grooming gimmicks have made achieving childlike genitals the new normal. Not surprisingly, there seems to be a hair story in the news just about every day, and because we live in the twenty-first century, most of these stories then leap to Twitter, Facebook, and TMZ, and heavens knows where else. Before long, the whole world--or just a few thousand people--is debating Jennifer Aniston''s layers, Michelle Obama''s bangs, the toxins in hair dyes, the Duchess of Cambridge''s teasing her husband about his bald spot, a movie star on a TMI jag about her pubic hair, a child expelled from school for a hairstyle, an Olympic gymnast condemned for her kinky hair, and the US Army''s issuing new rules about which hairstyles are permitted and which are not. News stories about hair run the gamut from pop-culture fluff to ethnic and racial hot buttons, and the hottest of those often involve African Americans and their tresses. If we''re black, we know the landscape of this territory intimately. If we''re not, we may be oblivious to the very separate world of African American hair, an issue so complex and charged that it''s been the subject of dozens of books--histories, self-help, and photo essays. Long before Good Hair , Maya Angelou told her own hair history in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings , and in his autobiography, Malcolm X describes his introduction to getting his hair straightened into a "conk," using lye, eggs, and potatoes, and later his condemnation of this brutal technique. In African American culture, "good hair" is smooth and soft. For many of the other contributors, "good hair" is also the straight hair that they don''t have naturally and always wanted. As all unhappy families are different in their own ways, each story here of a woman at war with her hair is unique. Fortunately, not all contributors have had such adversarial relationships, though family conflict and connection were often acted out through the writers'' hair and the locks of other family members. While it''s easy to make light of our obsession with our hair, very few of the writers in these pages do that. We get that hair is serious. It''s our glory, our nemesis, our history, our sexuality, our religion, our vanity, our joy, and our mortality. It''s true that there are many things in life that matter more than hair, but few that matter in quite these complicated, energizing, and interconnected ways. As near as I can tell, that''s the long and short of it.

Details