The First Man-Made Man
The Story of Two Sex Changes, One Love Affair, and a Twentieth-Century Medical Revolution
2007
First Published
3.63
Average Rating
224
Number of Pages
In the 1920s when Laura Dillon felt like a man trapped in a woman's body, there were no words to describe her condition; transsexuals had yet to enter common usage. And there was no known solution to being stuck between the sexes. Laura Dillon did all she could on her own: she cut her hair, dressed in men's clothing, bound her breasts with a belt. But in a desperate bid to feel comfortable in her own skin, she experimented with breakthrough technologies that ultimately transformed the human body and revolutionized medicine. From upper-class orphan girl to Oxford lesbian, from post-surgery romance with Roberta Cowell (an early male-to-female) to self-imposed exile in India, Michael Dillon's incredible story reveals the struggles of early transsexuals and challenges conventional notions of what gender really means.
Avg Rating
3.63
Number of Ratings
331
5 STARS
17%
4 STARS
40%
3 STARS
32%
2 STARS
9%
1 STARS
1%
goodreads
Author
Pagan Kennedy
Author · 12 books
Pagan Kennedy is a regular contributor to the New York Times and author of eleven books. A biography titled Black Livingstone made the NewYork Times Notable list and earned Massachusetts Book Award honors. She also has been the recipient of a Barnes and Noble Discover Award, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Fiction, and a Smithsonian Fellowship for science writing. Visit her online at www.pagankennedy.net. "
