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Product Info
Publisher: Canongate
Author: Lemn Sissay
ISBN: 9781786892362
Year: 2020
Format: Paperback
Non fiction, Memoir
My Name Is Why
by
Lemn Sissay
My Name Is Why by
Lemn Sissay
Reviews
"Searing… Unputdownable… My Name Is Why is authentic and beautiful, a potential game-changer in public attitudes to children raised in care. It’s about bureaucratic cruelty and what happens when love is absent. Don’t miss it."
The Times
Summary
At the age of seventeen, after a childhood in a foster family followed by six years in care homes, Norman Greenwood was given his birth certificate. He learned that his real name was not Norman. It was Lemn Sissay. He was British and Ethiopian. And he learned that his mother had been pleading for his safe return to her since his birth.
This is Lemn’s story: a story of neglect and determination, misfortune and hope, cruelty and triumph.
Sissay reflects on his childhood, self-expression and Britishness, and in doing so explores the institutional care system, race, family and the meaning of home. Written with all the lyricism and power you would expect from one of the nation’s best-loved poets, this moving, frank and timely memoir is the result of a life spent asking questions, and a celebration of the redemptive power of creativity.
The Number One Sunday Times Bestseller. Indie Book Award Non-Fiction Winner.
