The First Man-Made Man: The Story of Two Sex Changes, One Love Affair, and a Twentieth-Century Medical Revolution

Features

• Cover Type: Paperback with 224 pages
• Published by: Bloomsbury USA
• Edition: 1st Edition March 4, 2008
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 159691016X
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-1596910164
• Book Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Weighs: 7.2 ounces

From Publishers Weekly
In 1950, Michael Dillon, a dapper, bearded medical student, met Roberta Cowell, a boyish-looking woman, for lunch in a discreet London restaurant. During the lunch, Dillon announced that five years earlier he was a lady named Laura, and Roberta stated she was on her way to full womanhood from being Robert. Eventually, Cowell (a former Royal Air Force captain) would garner fame as a glamorous lady and author of the 1954 bestseller Roberta Cowell's Story, while in 1958 Dillon began a long, rocky journey to become a Tibetan monk. But Kennedy (Black Livingstone) does far more than detail their short-lived, topsy-turvy transgender romance. She gives us an enlightening tour of how mid-century science conceptualized gender, hormones and transsexual surgery, as well as how advances in plastic surgery for men maimed in WWI became the basis for sex change operations. Kennedy's slangy style—she describes presurgery Dillon as living in the "slushy canal between sexes"—also suits the material. Though her effort doesn't surpass other books on the topic—especially Joanne Meyerowitz's How Sex Changed: A History of Transsexuality in the United States—it's an entertaining and informative popular history. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From School Library Journal
Adult/High School—Born into a wealthy family near the beginning of the 20th century, Laura Dillon attended Oxford University and went on to become a doctor, a published author, and, eventually, a man named Michael. At Oxford, she tried to identify as a homosexual, but that didn't quite fit; it would be years before the words transsexual or transgendered were coined. In 1939, Dillon began to experiment with a new drug, testosterone. Her life changed after meeting Dr. Gillies, a practitioner in the emerging field of plastic surgery, who performed several operations to reconfigure Dillon's anatomy. Upon meeting Roberta Crowell in 1949, Michael believed that he had found his soul mate. Born and raised as a man, Crowell was in the process of transforming into a woman. Following a failed love affair, Dillon traveled to India to study Buddhism. He died a pauper after finally discovering happiness among monks in Tibet. He left a legacy of notebooks, memoirs, and a groundbreaking treatise on the nature of sex and gender. These form the basis of Kennedy's narrative, which leapfrogs back and forth across Dillon's life. Kennedy traces the emotional isolation and triumphs throughout Dillon's struggle to define himself according to his own rules. The author peppers the text with historical details of early-20th-century medicine and evolving notions of gender in Western society. This story is fascinating to modern readers whether or not they have personal questions about gender.—Heidi Dolamore, San Mateo County Library, CA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Reader Reviews
This review is from: The First Man-Made Man: The Story of Two Sex Changes, One Love Affair, and a Twentieth-Century Medical Revolution (Hardcover) Gay is the new straight and trans is the new gay. Maybe, soon enough, TG will become the neo hippie. All in your mind. Dolly Parton, after all, has had a lot more surgery than Christine Jorgensen ever did. So let us now push further. Not as emotional or as 'literary' as Chris Beam's Transparent, Pagan Kennedy has nevertheless penned the 1st trans book anyone outside the trans world 'should' read. Trans is coming soon to Hollywood, I betcha, and here's a real contender. The First Man-Made Man works several themes - history (Hirschfeld, Benjamin, et al.), drama ('burned by the blonde') and ideology (modern ID data necessitated HRT and SRS, which led to mainstream cosmetic surgery) - quite cohesively. Kennedy's metanarrative is not 'transition' however, but self-actualization via reinvention. Protagonist Dillion's eternal quest (from FtM, then from Oxford Englishman to Tibetan monk) keeps the humanist foundation of this saga transparent - and tendentious. Kennedy's conclusion that, by today, "gender had become ... a show tune you lip-synched when it matched the secret beat of your own heart" will assuredly infuriate postops (deal, ladies) but it will resound with a bewildered (mainstream) boomer. Robert Owen, roll over - the new plastic man and woman (and genderfu**er) have arrived, to conquer the universe. Which sounds about right on time to me!