Recollections of My Nonexistence by Rebecca Solnit. Advance Reader Copy (eARC) from the publisher via Netgalley included. No affiliate links used. Read my full disclosure policy here.
Rebecca Solnit is one of my favourite essayists, so her memoir Recollections of My Nonexistence was on my anticipated releases of 2020 list. So much so, that I have read it twice since its publication last March.
Let's overlook the fact that it has taken me a year to actually review it! I read loads and took copious notes last year, but my concentration didn't stretch to writing full reviews so I am playing catch up.
Many of the experiences Solnit shares are centred around the studio apartment in San Francisco that was her home for over twenty years. It is here that she grapples with the realisation that the "nonexistence" she feels is as a result of the patriarchy.
That her instinct to disappear, by blending into the background of whatever situation she is in, is an attempt to avoid the wrath of men. An instinct, she contends, that many, if not all, women have because we internalise the idea that our actions are responsible for the abuse - in all its forms - we receive from men.
Rationally we know that it isn't true but we have been socialised to act as if it is nonetheless.
As with her essays, the themes Solnit explores here include gender based violence, feminism and its continued evolution, environmental justice, queer activism and politics, and the impact of fear and trauma on creativity.
Recollections of My Nonexistence is an assured study of how Solnit found her voice; as a woman, as an activist, as a feminist, and ultimately as a writer.
Solnit skilfully blends the personal, the political, and the cultural giving us an engaging memoir about reclaiming our power by stepping out of the shadows.
Recollections of My Nonexistence by Rebecca Solnit is published by Granta and is available in hardback, paperback, ebook, and audiobook format.