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It's Fun to Be a Person I Don't Know
At first glance a reader might mistake It’s Fun to Be a Person I Don’t Know for a juicy Hollywood tell-all, given Chachi D. Hauser’s background as the great-granddaughter of Roy Disney, a cofounder with his brother Walt of the Walt Disney Company. And to her credit, Hauser doesn’t shy away from confronting painful family memories when considering how the stories, myths, and rumors surrounding this entertainment empire have influenced her own imagination. But family history is only one strand in this intricate and variegated weave that also interlaces the social and environmental history of Hauser’s adopted hometown of New Orleans, intimate reflections on love and navigating open relationships, and a searing self-examination that reveals a gender fluidity chafing against social barriers.
Hauser’s innovative and multifaceted narrative navigates a variety of terrains, seeking truth as its final destination. While the family company excels in fantasy, Hauser’s story is that of a young documentary filmmaker determined to train a sharply focused lens on the reality of her lived experiences.
Hauser’s innovative and multifaceted narrative navigates a variety of terrains, seeking truth as its final destination. While the family company excels in fantasy, Hauser’s story is that of a young documentary filmmaker determined to train a sharply focused lens on the reality of her lived experiences.
- GenresMemoir
202 pages, Paperback
Published March 1, 2023
8 people are currently reading
117 people want to read
About the author
Chachi D. Hauser
1 book2 followersChachi Hauser (she/they) is the author of It's fun to be a person I don't know. Her work appears in Prairie Schooner, Lit Hub, Swamp Pink, and The Writer's Chronicle.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
April 18, 2023
I came out of reading this book feeling overwhelmed and amazed. The beauty of the language is quite particular; the precision of it holds an unlikely warmth. The sentences are micro-waves of emotions that end up building a huge swell once you finish the book. I think the subjugation comes from the rawness of the events and feelings the author describes - the good, the bad, the beauty, and the ugly. I loved the constellations of meanings and associations she built between places, people and her own heritage. I know she mentions that she doesn’t like astrology - but it does feel like she mapped out a birth chart of her lived experiences. Even though it's a work of non-fiction, I very much felt like I was entering the world of a fiction character. The writing is magnetic and feels like it's the author's superpower to make sense of her world.
November 18, 2023
A friend gifted me this book, and boy did it come at the right time in my life. I found myself frequently setting the book down between chapters just to pace myself and savor every messy, contradictory, thoughtful and beautiful essay about the author’s family, identity, relationships, etc. I love the way Chachi writes about love; we than see them changing their mind and realizing new ways of thinking and feeling in the moment of writing the essays. Nonfiction is one of my favorite genres to read precisely because of this, and this book in particular is one of my favorites to date.
December 30, 2023
All year I’ve been searching for a book where I could see myself in the story, and this one was it. One of my new favorites. It was so incredibly honest and intimate and felt like reading my own journal at times (if I had any ability to write well).
February 22, 2024
Fantastic. When it’s my time to write a memoir, this is the format that I will be thinking about. Loved everything about this book - such a pleasure and privilege to read it.
December 8, 2023
I think I’ve read this book so many times because it’s rare for someone to bring you into their world and precisely create THAT feeling. I honestly don’t even know how to express it myself, but it’s almost like a feeling of pure “okayness” after all the dust settles. It’s a feeling of “Well, here we are now, I guess. I suppose I’ll write about it because I have to, but maybe you’re in here somewhere too”.
And even though very few people may have grown up on the island of Manhattan with a middle name like Disney, we do find ourselves right there.
With faint images of Peter Pan and other lost boys who could never grow up flashing hazily before us, the lap bar pulls down, and we watch someone grow up who never felt at home in their own body. We too feel the excitement of using the wrong bathroom, the weight of conformity, the people who fought with us, and the treasure and bliss of pushing right back.
We float back to the highs and lows of underground parties in New Orleans, long nights turned early mornings, and the sights and smells of waking up early for work on Bourbon street as the booze and piss float back down to the gutter.
It’s shared cigarettes with lovers you knew would never work out, the real pain and nausea of the one’s who should’ve never been, and glimpses of optimism for the ones who might just be worth it someday.
Their life and stories are brought outside and placed down carefully to look at, like plants you’ve kept on your windowsill all winter to survive the freeze. After a long hibernation and years of reflection, you get to see them all right here, no dogma, no bullshit, and in the most beautiful way, maybe with no definite message or resolution at all. It’s all the things we ended up with and frantically try to find a place for, and with humanistic compassion and knifelike honestly, Chachi Hauser seems to tell us that maybe we don’t fucking have to. Maybe we can just look at them together, like potted plants in the sun.
And even though very few people may have grown up on the island of Manhattan with a middle name like Disney, we do find ourselves right there.
With faint images of Peter Pan and other lost boys who could never grow up flashing hazily before us, the lap bar pulls down, and we watch someone grow up who never felt at home in their own body. We too feel the excitement of using the wrong bathroom, the weight of conformity, the people who fought with us, and the treasure and bliss of pushing right back.
We float back to the highs and lows of underground parties in New Orleans, long nights turned early mornings, and the sights and smells of waking up early for work on Bourbon street as the booze and piss float back down to the gutter.
It’s shared cigarettes with lovers you knew would never work out, the real pain and nausea of the one’s who should’ve never been, and glimpses of optimism for the ones who might just be worth it someday.
Their life and stories are brought outside and placed down carefully to look at, like plants you’ve kept on your windowsill all winter to survive the freeze. After a long hibernation and years of reflection, you get to see them all right here, no dogma, no bullshit, and in the most beautiful way, maybe with no definite message or resolution at all. It’s all the things we ended up with and frantically try to find a place for, and with humanistic compassion and knifelike honestly, Chachi Hauser seems to tell us that maybe we don’t fucking have to. Maybe we can just look at them together, like potted plants in the sun.
December 23, 2023
The book is phenomenal. If you’ve ever spent any amount of time reflecting on love, longing, identity, complicated family stuff, or the wavy boundary between fantasy and reality, read this book and be rewarded with the hard-won perspective of a person with the fortitude to turn toward difficult thoughts and difficult experiences, and the sensitivity to see things there that others wouldn’t.
I want to echo other readers’ observations about this author’s openness to uncertainty – that it’s one of the most striking characteristics of the book. But I feel like this openness is exactly what makes them capable of harnessing the truth, or of getting closer to the truth. This applies as much to the writing as it does to the way the author seems to live their life. As I read (and reread) this book, I found myself wanting to emulate both. This writer makes you want to be as daring as they are.
And the writing itself is excellent. The language is beautiful and fluid, and the way the subjects and pieces weave together is balanced and thoughtful, but still feels free. Like the river that winds through every piece, the book gives the impression of something that is at once enduring and necessary and also adventurous and wild. I know this is a book I’m going to keep returning to, and I’m eager to see what this writer gives us next.
I want to echo other readers’ observations about this author’s openness to uncertainty – that it’s one of the most striking characteristics of the book. But I feel like this openness is exactly what makes them capable of harnessing the truth, or of getting closer to the truth. This applies as much to the writing as it does to the way the author seems to live their life. As I read (and reread) this book, I found myself wanting to emulate both. This writer makes you want to be as daring as they are.
And the writing itself is excellent. The language is beautiful and fluid, and the way the subjects and pieces weave together is balanced and thoughtful, but still feels free. Like the river that winds through every piece, the book gives the impression of something that is at once enduring and necessary and also adventurous and wild. I know this is a book I’m going to keep returning to, and I’m eager to see what this writer gives us next.
April 18, 2023
Some books affirm everything you know. Others change you irrevocably. "It's Fun to Be a Person I Don't Know" is the second kind of book. Hauser's connected essays explore what it means to be a person in this world, grappling with how family legacy, climate change, privilege, power structures, and social norms do and not shape us. Hauser explores gender, relationships, sexuality, creativity, culture, history...nothing is off limits. Nothing is taboo. Everything is worth examining when it comes to examining what it means to live a life. Of course, the prose is stunning. I found myself wanting to collect sentences like shells on a beach and bring them home with me.
August 30, 2024
Picked this up in a thrift store because it was randomly on the shelf. Decided to give this book a try after I read that the author is a descendant of the Walt Disney family and was very interested. Immediately Hauser’s prose encapsulated me. They were able to make a nonfiction memoir feel fictionlike, feel magical, feel informative. She successfully combined moments of teaching with her own experiences and it made the read incredibly raw. Hauser’s ability to bounce back and forth her timeline is exceptional and was not confusing nor a bad choice. Their collection of essays tells a great reflection on what identity, gender, and art are and how they can be expressed, felt, and created.
August 21, 2025
This memoir is a beautiful exploration of what it means to define oneself apart from a family that everyone knows, a name that comes with particular expectations and associations, as well as discovering one's identity and voice.
July 17, 2023
Unique and personal and raw. A book with essays I’ll constantly think about and re read for a long time.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews