Once Out of Nature: Selected Essays on the Transformation of Gender

by Joy Ladin

This compassionate, constructive volume collects eleven essays written between 2008, on the cusp of what Time called America's “transgender tipping point,” and 2021, as anti-trans laws began metastasizing around America. Drawing on her experiences as a trans parent, spouse, teacher, and author, she writes honestly and insightfully about gender, exploring its intersections with feminisms, psychotherapy, divinity, ontology, and even the poems of Emily Dickinson. Written for any curious reader, these essays teach us about who we are, who we can be, and what it means to be human.

Genres: Poetry, Nonfiction, Memoir

158 pages, Paperback

Published September 10, 2024

Reviews

[Lindsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

"I started writing what I considered poetry as soon as I learned to write. I don't know why. Poetry wasn't read in my family, and no one knew what to make of the "poems," or rather, rhyming couplets and quatrains, I insisted on showing them. Like my sense that I was female, writing poetry made me different in ways others couldn't understand. But unlike my female gender identification, I wasn't ashamed, afraid of, or willing to hide this difference. Writing poetry was the only activity that seemed to free me from my body and the maleness that went with it; while I wrote, I felt like I was soaring above them, creating a world in which I didn't have to hide, a world that couldn't exist without me."

[Tyler Gaedecke · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.0 // Lucid writing that makes a compelling demonstration of spirituality’s role in making sense of (and safely navigating) human similarity and difference - and how learning from trans experience can clarify that further.

“…the sense of being other than we are supposed to be is inherent in the nature of what human beings rather misleadingly call our identities.” (p. 44)

[Elena Margolin · Rating 4 out of 5]

i loved how the author described her struggle and journey with gender expression, but i found the writing to be hard to follow (long sentences w multiple complex ideas + spelling mistakes??).

LOVED the last chapter / essay on gender expression and divinity, talking about the Jewish female god and how the author used poetry to speak as a female persona before her transition.