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Autobiography of my Body
As he embarks on a relationship with a sexually insatiable woman, Charles Bradford plumbs the depths of sexual desire and fantasy, entering an erotic, complex, dangerous, and destructive world. Reprint.
- GenresFiction
400 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1991
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About the author
David Guy
7 books41 followersI was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, which in some way still seems like home, though I haven’t lived there for years. I attended Shady Side Academy, graduating in 1966, and enrolled from there in Duke University, where I studied with Reynolds Price and Wallace Fowlie, earning a BA and eventually an MAT. My first job was as an English teacher at Forsyth Country Day School in Winston-Salem. I moved back to Durham in 1976, and have lived here ever since, except for a two-year stay in Cambridge while my wife was in graduate school.
I was eleven years old when I first saw that there was something about language that fascinated me, fifteen when I decided—God help me—that I wanted to be a writer. Though I have worked in libraries and taught at various schools and in different capacities, writing has been my true vocation. I have sometimes thought of it as the work I do, other times as a pastime, but it has always been the activity I most enjoy. In the decade beginning when I was 32, I published four novels, Football Dreams (1980), The Man Who Loved Dirty Books (1983), Second Brother (1985), and The Autobiography of My Body (1990). I also published articles in various publications during those years, and was active as a book reviewer.
In 1991, when my wife dragged me to a class at the Cambridge Insight Meditation Center, I discovered the spiritual practice that became central to my life, and grew interested in Buddhism. I think of myself as a “householder yogin” (in the words of Reginald Ray, quoting Chogyam Trungpa) and see “the sitting practice of meditation” as my “primary life commitment.” I have practiced in the Vipassana, Tibetan, and Zen traditions, but don’t consider those distinctions important. Since 1995 I have practiced with Josho Pat Phelan at the Chapel Hill Zen Center, with regular forays back to the Insight Meditation Society.
I worked with my first meditation teacher, Larry Rosenberg, on two books, Breath by Breath: The Liberating Practice of Insight Meditation (1994) and Living in the Light of Death: On the Art of Being Truly Alive (2001). I wrote for various Buddhist publications during those years, and published The Red Thread of Passion: Spirituality and the Paradox of Sex (1999).
In 2001 I began working at Duke’s Sanford School of Public Policy, teaching in both the MPP and Hart Leadership Programs. I retired in 2014, though I still work part-time for Hart Leadership. Working at Duke freed me to get back to narrative writing, and in 2007 I published Jake Fades: A Novel of Impermanence. I currently live part of the year in Durham and part in Asheville, and spend my time writing, reading, sitting, swimming at various pools, taking long walks, and getting together with friends.
I was eleven years old when I first saw that there was something about language that fascinated me, fifteen when I decided—God help me—that I wanted to be a writer. Though I have worked in libraries and taught at various schools and in different capacities, writing has been my true vocation. I have sometimes thought of it as the work I do, other times as a pastime, but it has always been the activity I most enjoy. In the decade beginning when I was 32, I published four novels, Football Dreams (1980), The Man Who Loved Dirty Books (1983), Second Brother (1985), and The Autobiography of My Body (1990). I also published articles in various publications during those years, and was active as a book reviewer.
In 1991, when my wife dragged me to a class at the Cambridge Insight Meditation Center, I discovered the spiritual practice that became central to my life, and grew interested in Buddhism. I think of myself as a “householder yogin” (in the words of Reginald Ray, quoting Chogyam Trungpa) and see “the sitting practice of meditation” as my “primary life commitment.” I have practiced in the Vipassana, Tibetan, and Zen traditions, but don’t consider those distinctions important. Since 1995 I have practiced with Josho Pat Phelan at the Chapel Hill Zen Center, with regular forays back to the Insight Meditation Society.
I worked with my first meditation teacher, Larry Rosenberg, on two books, Breath by Breath: The Liberating Practice of Insight Meditation (1994) and Living in the Light of Death: On the Art of Being Truly Alive (2001). I wrote for various Buddhist publications during those years, and published The Red Thread of Passion: Spirituality and the Paradox of Sex (1999).
In 2001 I began working at Duke’s Sanford School of Public Policy, teaching in both the MPP and Hart Leadership Programs. I retired in 2014, though I still work part-time for Hart Leadership. Working at Duke freed me to get back to narrative writing, and in 2007 I published Jake Fades: A Novel of Impermanence. I currently live part of the year in Durham and part in Asheville, and spend my time writing, reading, sitting, swimming at various pools, taking long walks, and getting together with friends.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
May 8, 2013
I really liked the honesty of this book, especially since Americans are so taboo with sexual issues and sex is a part of life and an incredibly important part of relationships that often gets skipped in literature or made profane, graphic, and porn-like just for sensationalism; however, Guy does not use it that way. He uses it naturally and allows us to see all aspects of Charles and what makes him tick as he tries to come to terms with his body, self, family, and the women in his life.
Guy explores the physical in connection with the psychological and spiritual in a way many novelists shy away from and his prose is magnificently suited to these topics. I personally am not a fan of certain words used to describe sex acts and body parts and he uses these quite a bit; however, that's the way certain people talk and think and Charles and his contemporaries are people who speak like that. His writing is stellar and he takes on complex issues with such grace and tolerance.
He examines, in depth, the ambiguity of people and their behaviors. Even though his characters do stupid, unethical, or immoral things you still have empathy for them. He allows Charles to develop through all of his relationships- self, parents, siblings, his women...
His narrative is compelling and descriptive and maybe I'm biased because I know Pittsburgh and I know the character of Pittsburgh at the time the novel was set and he did a bang up job of bringing that city to life.
I look forward to reading more of his novels.
The writing is superb. It's a stupid reason not to give it five stars but the reason I didn't is because of the typset. It just really annoyed me and detracted from the flow of reading.
Guy explores the physical in connection with the psychological and spiritual in a way many novelists shy away from and his prose is magnificently suited to these topics. I personally am not a fan of certain words used to describe sex acts and body parts and he uses these quite a bit; however, that's the way certain people talk and think and Charles and his contemporaries are people who speak like that. His writing is stellar and he takes on complex issues with such grace and tolerance.
He examines, in depth, the ambiguity of people and their behaviors. Even though his characters do stupid, unethical, or immoral things you still have empathy for them. He allows Charles to develop through all of his relationships- self, parents, siblings, his women...
His narrative is compelling and descriptive and maybe I'm biased because I know Pittsburgh and I know the character of Pittsburgh at the time the novel was set and he did a bang up job of bringing that city to life.
I look forward to reading more of his novels.
The writing is superb. It's a stupid reason not to give it five stars but the reason I didn't is because of the typset. It just really annoyed me and detracted from the flow of reading.
November 28, 2020
A bit more graphic than I am used to, but the writing was brilliant.
January 5, 2009
Erica-Jong-with-a-sex-change meets Freud.
October 19, 2012
the story of a man in search of a hug. adult sexual themes and parental relations. entertaining titillating but there are better books
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews