Ten Steps to Nanette: A Memoir Situation

Now I'm wishing I had listened to the audio book, because while I remember watching the netflix Nanette, and being very moved by it, I can't quite pull up the details. I remember that it was an extraordinary act of honesty, and this memoir follows suit. There is a lot of trauma and pain. There is a lot of thoughtful analysis of foul human politics. There is a great deal of self-insightful journeying and growth. May we all strive to hold ourselves to Hannah's goal of holding her audience kindly while opening their eyes to the pain of others. We all have pain, we all have glory. The world trends towards a better place when we can see each other and empathize.

Finally read the entire thing, or more accurately, listened to them tell it on audiobook. (I needed to stay in bed for a day.) Thankfully, having seen Nanette I was braced for the most traumatic stuff they talks about, however they downplay a lot of it because they are not really interested in spending any more time talking about it. There's a lot about the forces that shaped them, especially their family, and I really loved being taken through their artistic process. A really winner.

When Robin Williams died everyone spoke about how it was such a travesty that someone so funny could die, that no one knew there was a such a dark history weighing him down…. So when Hannah talks of her personal and dark history…. We of course tell her she’s not funny and shouldnt discuss such things so openly….

Look it’s dark and it’s fucked up…. But Hannah tells it from a healthier point of view. She’s has processed a lot and really the historical references are a neat way to pin into you how things came about. Why they came about. It hurts… but so did her life. I can’t take it upon myself to not appreciate what the story took to bring to life

This book is life-changing.

well-written, but a book you need to read in small doses for all the pain...

Getting in tune with Hannah Gadsby has taken me a while. A slow burn. An emerging revelation. I’m a straight, white, cis, anglo, old man. Peeling back a lifetime of wrong socialisation requires work. Hannah’s been a help. Nanette was like a jolt awake. And now this book invites us inside her head to the ground of her phenomenal talent. Thank you so much.

Anyone who admired Hannah Gadsby's Netflix specials, Nanette and Douglas will want to give this book a look.

For the first half, Gadsby recounts her 1980s and '90s childhood in conjunction with a history of homophobia in Australia, contrasting, paralleling and overlapping. The second half is her adulthood with all its additional traumas, therapy and diagnoses as she creates and refines her many different stand-up shows. It's heavy stuff, but as in her specials it alternates between keeping it light with regularly placed jokes and making it riveting during the dramatic moments.

I'm rating this 4 stars, but I'm rounding up from 3.5 stars because sometimes things get vague or brushed over and some subjects come up only to disappear without a full accounting. I read the paper book, but almost wish I did the audiobook thing more often, because being narrated by Gadsby would probably move this into an even higher level.

Best for:
People who like memoirs, especially ones that go in unexpected places.

In a nutshell:
Comedian Hannah Gadsby tells of her life growing up in Tasmania, her career in comedy, and how she built her one-of-a-kind show Nanette.

Worth quoting:
“The lies of a vulnerable minority should never have been put into the hands of the majority in a media landscape that is all too happy to be powered by the fumes of a toxic debate.”

“I find joy in my life where I once couldn’t because I was too busy trying to do the ‘right’ thing instead of checking in with my own needs first.”

Why I chose it:
I’m a fan of Gadsby’s comedy, and the way she constructs a show.

Review:
In this memoir, Gadsby shares so much of her life, and she does so in an interesting way. I read a LOT of memoirs, and this is one that took me a bit by surprise. It shouldn’t have, but it did. Like much of her comedy, Gadsby’s book is clever, intelligent, unique and unexpected.

The entire section about the 1990s is really well done, with each year discussed in a clever way highlighting things that happened that year in Australia and worldwide, as well as in her life. As someone completely unfamiliar with Australian politics, I appreciated hearing her take on things, and how the debate over the right for gay people to live their lives without prosecution, and then the right for people to marry who they loved, and how that deeply impacted her as a queer person.

She shares her trauma, but it isn’t traumatic, if that makes sense. She doesn’t provide detail unless she needs to. As always, she is careful with her words and edits where its needed.

I started the book and read the first couple of chapters but then put it down for a month. It’s a long book, and while its so well-written, it wasn’t an easy read. Then yesterday, which was a holiday here in the UK, I decided to finish it. I read basically all day, and I finished it, and I think that was the best way to take it in. All in one or two sittings. Some books lend themselves easily to chapter by chapter; I think this one is best when the reader can really dive into Gadsby’s story.

Something to note, which again, shouldn’t be a surprise. My partner was sitting next to me basically the entire time I was reading the book, and when I finished, he commented that I didn’t laugh at all while reading it. And it is true that I didn’t laugh out loud because it’s not a funny memoir. There are parts where I chuckled inside - I mean, Gadsby is brilliant, and that translates well to the page - but this is not a funny book. It is a serious memoir that takes on serious topics.

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