The Cost of Living: A Working Autobiography

There is a price to pay to cover the toll that life claims. In this affecting display of images and thoughts of a midlife woman escaping the constraints of marriage to pursue her autonomy as a writer, author Deborah Levy broodingly dwells on the cultural constraints imposed upon the female sex. Reawakening memories from her youth, especially of her much loved mother and her former partner, she mystically drafts the pattern of her earlier life and expectations. With wit and sharp insight, she probes into the inner thoughts of students, mentors, acquaintances, and always of herself. Parodying the male view of women, she describes the husband who never looks at his wife, of the man who can’t remember his spouse’s name. Unconventional associations are valued, as is her eccentric patron Celia and her male friend who cried at the funeral. Follow her reflections as she recalls writings of the feminist Simone deBeauvoir, the poet Emily Dickinson, the fluent James Baldwin and others.

Reading this memoir is attuned to reading an intimate diary, where the writer elegiacally exposes past repressed musings about the status of herself as a writer and women in general. Like good wine, it should be sipped slowly and appreciatively.