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sorren_briarwood 's review for:
To Be A Trans Man: Our Stories of Transition, Acceptance and Joy
by Ezra Woodger
I received an ARC from NetGalley in return for an honest review.
To Be A Trans Man is a quick, but rewarding read, filled with thoughtful commentary on gender, masculinity, patriarchy, and more. Woodger is clearly a very competent invterviewer, and these interviews have a friendly, confessional tone. I appreciated that common threads between each interview emerged organically, and that Woodger didn’t impose excessive commentary onto these interviews– just the foreword and the afterword. This isn’t a piece of analysis, but as advertised, a collection of interviews, allowing for the reader to reflect themselves on each transmaculine individual’s experiences as told in their own words.
Because these interviews are so conversational, I couldn’t help wishing that I could hear each of them, and I couldn’t help but wonder if this book would have been more successful in a podcast format, or something like it. I also found my appetite wasn’t quite sated by the time I finished: I was eager to hear from a few more individuals, given how strong all these interviews were. However, I still greatly enjoyed this reading experience, and am looking forward to engaging further with Woodger’s work in the future.
Perusing other reviews, I’ve noticed a few things I wanted to touch on. The first of which is complaints regarding the fact that various influencers, activists, etc. were consulted in this book, rather than those of us with more “normal,” occupations. Personally, I enjoyed the interviewees chosen for a few key reasons: transmascs aren’t exactly spoiled for choice when it comes to public figures we can look up to and draw inspiration from, and I found it inspiring hearing from so many successful trans men who were public about their transition– I’m confident anyone grappling with the choice of whether to remain safely stealth or step out of the closet in the name of activism, community, and/or solidarity will feel similarly. (Besides, none of these transmascs are exactly Beyonce– I happen to know who Eza Michel is, for example, and listen to his music, but ~230,000 streams on his most popular song on Spotify does not exactly a superstar-make.) On the heels of that, so many of us that are out are involved in activism simply because our rights (and the rights of the wider trans community) are under such vicious attack, and simply existing is viewed as a political statement by the right. Activism and community outreach is a vital facet of trans culture, and it simply can’t be cleaved from the trans experience: it belongs in this book.
I’ve also noticed one or two cisgender readers commenting that they felt confused by this book, or left with further questions, having picked it up to learn about the transgender community. Good! This isn’t a thesis statement, it clearly invites readers to reflect for themselves. I’d argue that this book isn’t a starting point for those just beginning to educate themselves about the community– nor does it purport to be. This is a more nuanced conversation about the multifaceted experience of being transgender, and it was refreshing to read something that doesn’t grind to a halt to explain basic terminology every few paragraphs. It’s certainly not bogged down in terminology, or scientific- these are casual conversations after all, but if you don’t come to this book with at least a basic understanding of what it means to be trans, you might find yourself lost: if you are looking for a basic introduction, there are plenty of books that fill that niche, and I don’t think it’s fair to judge this book on that basis.
To summarise, I would recommend this book to anyone with a basic understanding of gender theory, looking to hear from more voices, and particularly to anyone particularly interested in exploring masculinity and masculine identity in the context of a patriarchal, cisheteronormative status-quo.
To Be A Trans Man is a quick, but rewarding read, filled with thoughtful commentary on gender, masculinity, patriarchy, and more. Woodger is clearly a very competent invterviewer, and these interviews have a friendly, confessional tone. I appreciated that common threads between each interview emerged organically, and that Woodger didn’t impose excessive commentary onto these interviews– just the foreword and the afterword. This isn’t a piece of analysis, but as advertised, a collection of interviews, allowing for the reader to reflect themselves on each transmaculine individual’s experiences as told in their own words.
Because these interviews are so conversational, I couldn’t help wishing that I could hear each of them, and I couldn’t help but wonder if this book would have been more successful in a podcast format, or something like it. I also found my appetite wasn’t quite sated by the time I finished: I was eager to hear from a few more individuals, given how strong all these interviews were. However, I still greatly enjoyed this reading experience, and am looking forward to engaging further with Woodger’s work in the future.
Perusing other reviews, I’ve noticed a few things I wanted to touch on. The first of which is complaints regarding the fact that various influencers, activists, etc. were consulted in this book, rather than those of us with more “normal,” occupations. Personally, I enjoyed the interviewees chosen for a few key reasons: transmascs aren’t exactly spoiled for choice when it comes to public figures we can look up to and draw inspiration from, and I found it inspiring hearing from so many successful trans men who were public about their transition– I’m confident anyone grappling with the choice of whether to remain safely stealth or step out of the closet in the name of activism, community, and/or solidarity will feel similarly. (Besides, none of these transmascs are exactly Beyonce– I happen to know who Eza Michel is, for example, and listen to his music, but ~230,000 streams on his most popular song on Spotify does not exactly a superstar-make.) On the heels of that, so many of us that are out are involved in activism simply because our rights (and the rights of the wider trans community) are under such vicious attack, and simply existing is viewed as a political statement by the right. Activism and community outreach is a vital facet of trans culture, and it simply can’t be cleaved from the trans experience: it belongs in this book.
I’ve also noticed one or two cisgender readers commenting that they felt confused by this book, or left with further questions, having picked it up to learn about the transgender community. Good! This isn’t a thesis statement, it clearly invites readers to reflect for themselves. I’d argue that this book isn’t a starting point for those just beginning to educate themselves about the community– nor does it purport to be. This is a more nuanced conversation about the multifaceted experience of being transgender, and it was refreshing to read something that doesn’t grind to a halt to explain basic terminology every few paragraphs. It’s certainly not bogged down in terminology, or scientific- these are casual conversations after all, but if you don’t come to this book with at least a basic understanding of what it means to be trans, you might find yourself lost: if you are looking for a basic introduction, there are plenty of books that fill that niche, and I don’t think it’s fair to judge this book on that basis.
To summarise, I would recommend this book to anyone with a basic understanding of gender theory, looking to hear from more voices, and particularly to anyone particularly interested in exploring masculinity and masculine identity in the context of a patriarchal, cisheteronormative status-quo.