Audre Lorde grew up in Harlem and Washington Heights in the 1930s and 1940s. The child of Black West Indian parents, she had a difficult start in life; legally blind from infancy, she was isolated from her surroundings and from family members who did not know how to connect with her and never really tried to extend themselves to find out. They were rather cold towards her, rarely loving and demonstrative. Lorde had two older sisters, who were very close to each other, but with whom she spent little time. Lorde was very strictly disciplined both at home and in the Catholic schools she attended. Lorde did not begin speaking until she was four years old, when she announced that she wanted to learn to read.
From the beginning of the book we see the shadow of racism over Lorde’s world. The family's landlord was so ashamed that he rented his property to a Black family that he committed suicide. A family trip to Washington was curtailed when they discovered that due to the Jim Crow laws they were not permitted to eat ice cream at a lunch counter. Yet despite this blatant and ever-present racism, Lorde witnessed very little of it because her mother was determined to hide it from her daughters, whom she wanted to grow up feeling that they had the power to do anything they chose. Lorde made friends as she got older and was even elected school magazine editor at her high school. This was also the first time she wrote poetry and began her career as a writer (though she did not yet see it as such). She experienced an early trauma when her best friend Gennie committed suicide, and vowed to never love anyone again because it was too difficult to lose them.
Lorde left home shortly after graduation and lost touch with her family almost immediately, immersing herself in her new grown-up world. She started dating a white boy named Peter, who eventually lost interest in her. He also got her pregnant, though she did not tell him. She had an abortion and, deciding she was ready to leave New York for a while, moved to Connecticut where she worked in a sweatshop masquerading as a legitimate factory. As a young Black woman, she was powerless to complain about working conditions and was considered lucky to have a job at all. She struck up a friendship with a woman named Ginger, and the two became lovers.
Lorde did not return to New York City until she heard that her father had passed away. She soon decided to move to Mexico, a place that was full of allure, especially to someone who was outside society’s margins during the repressive 1950s.
In Mexico, she experienced a great deal of happiness and freedom. She attended university classes, explored Mexico City, and became acquainted with a community of lesbians who were strong, independent, and represented exactly the kind of woman that Lorde wanted to be. She spent most of her time with Eudora, an older woman for whom she had strong feelings. Eudora was unstable, but taught Lorde profound lessons in life and love.
When Lorde returned to New York she roomed with a white progressive woman named Rhea. She took on a variety of jobs, but her race made it difficult to find something that inspired her or paid her fairly. She made friends and was part of the Greenwich Village lesbian scene, though she still felt like an outsider of sorts. She was in college throughout these years, knowing she had to get a degree or she would not have much of a future.
Lorde started a serious relationship with Muriel, a young Italian woman with a history of mental instability. The two of them were madly in love and moved in together, but eventually Muriel cheated on Lorde and mentally broke down. Lorde was devastated and found it difficult to extricate herself from the relationship, but finally the two of them separated. She did not think she would be able to be with anyone ever again, and was profoundly depressed.
The last woman Lorde writes of was a woman called Afrekete. The two had a passionate connection and Lorde began to heal from her despair over Muriel. Though Afrekete eventually moved away, Lorde was now strong enough to reflect on her relationship with her mother, and to take on the name “Zami,” which was a West Indian name (Carricou in particular, which was her mother’s region) for women who worked together and were lovers.
