Hysterical

A Memoir

De: Elissa Bassist

Narrado por: Elissa Bassist

Writer Elissa Bassist shares her journey to reclaim her authentic voice in a culture that doesn't listen to women in this medical mystery, cultural criticism, and rallying cry.

Between 2016 and 2018, Elissa Bassist saw over twenty medical professionals for a variety of mysterious ailments. Bassist had what millions of American women had: pain that didn’t make sense to doctors, a body that didn’t make sense to science, a psyche that didn’t make sense to mankind. But then an acupuncturist suggested some of her physical pain could be caged fury finding expression, and that treating her voice would treat the problem. It did.

Growing up, Bassist's family, boyfriends, school, work, and television had the same expectation for a woman’s voice: less is more. She was called dramatic and insane for speaking her mind; she was accused of overreacting and playing victim for having unexplained physical pain; she was ignored or rebuked like women throughout history for using her voice “inappropriately” by expressing sadness or suffering or anger or joy.

Because of this, she said “yes” when she meant “no”; she didn’t tweet #MeToo; and she never spoke without fear of being "too emotional." So, she felt rage, but like a good woman, repressed it. In Hysterical, Bassist explains how girls and women internalize and perpetuate directives about their voice, making it hard to emote or “just speak up” and “burn down the patriarchy.” But her silence hurt more than anything she could ever say. Hysterical is a memoir of a voice lost and found, and a primer on new ways to think about a woman’s voice, where it’s being squashed and where it needs amplification. Bassist breaks her own silences and calls on others to do the same—to unmute their voice, listen to it above all others, and use it again without regret.

©2022 Elissa Bassist (P)2022 Hachette Books

Reseñas de la Crítica

“Hysterical is staggeringly good. I am speechless, which as a reader, is a rare thing for me. I really just have a bunch of blubbering accolades to shower on Elissa. This is one of the most intelligent, painful, ridiculous, awesome, relevant things I've ever read. I am impressed.”—Roxane Gay

"One of the qualities I appreciated most about Hysterical is the way the author subtly and gracefully links her deeply personal life story to compelling questions about women’s sexuality, literature, history. We never notice her doing the connecting; the larger themes and analysis are seamlessly woven into the intimate story. She makes us think and care about not simply what happened to her, but about women’s bodies, our continued detachment from our own desire, our own complicity in the culture of sexual violence…This artful, moving work of creative nonfiction transcends the self, while keeping us rooted in the most intimate of stories.”—Danzy Senna, bestselling author of Caucasia and judge of the New School Chapbook Competition

“I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE Elissa's writing. That was five loves....Quite a special, strong, funny voice."—Joey Soloway, creator/writer/director/Emmy-award winner of Transparent

Hysterical!

Funny, thoughtful, heartbreaking, and inspiring! Thanks Elissa for sharing your voice and helping me to find mine.

Amazing

Amazing!!! Witty and clever. Very entertaining and relatable. I want to listen to it again! Elissa is a natural speaker. I have referred it to all my friends. I28 characters is a lot! I loved it. !!!!! I’ve got to be close to 128 characters. Not yet! I hope she writes another book. I would read it and buy it.

Magnificently Voiced

Validates that patriarchy lives in our bodies & that it will kill women in systemic fruition if we don’t speak/write/draw/express our human ideas especially through our voices. I Stopped to say out loud “Yes!“ several times throughout the book and finished it in 2 days.

Wow and Wow Spelled Backwards!

Pithy, playful, and poignant at the same time. intriguing read. Just happened to see it featured at my local library...glad I picked it up!

Truly Amazing!

Beautifully written!!! Deeply moving, touching and funny! I LOVE this book!!! Well researched and eye opening.

Amazing and much needed!

Thank you for expressing what we all are & have been experiencing forever, literally. I heard your solutions & I appreciate the information on how I can put women first in other ways in my life. Thank you again!

Such a needed book!

Elissa Bassist does such an amazing job of calling BS (autocorrect won't let me type the real word) on the patriarchy we call our current culture. With sometimes painful, sometimes hilarious, and always self-revealing stories, backed up with loads of research, Bassist summarizes the price women pay for being women and the clearest way to self empowerment: through using our voices. Fantastic narration too.

Powerful and well-written

Very raw and poignant storytelling. The writing is great and having the author read the book brings it to life even more.

So important, one listen isn't enough.

I want to become a professor of life so I can make Hysterical required reading for all. Memoirs are my life's blood, and I have yet to encounter one that better captures the asphyxiating experience that is womanhood - all while finding moments to make you breathless with laughter, no less!

Through essays rich with comedy, tragedy, and straight-up facts, Bassist breaks both tension and silence with enlightening humor and expertly crafted retellings of all too relatable experiences. As soon as I finished, I immediately started it over from the beginning.

If you've ever felt like the universe is full of evil sea witches who stole bits of your voice (and life) until you had nothing left, this book will prove that you're not alone, and you're not just "hysterical."

(I highly recommend giving this a listen because hearing Bassist's stories through her own voice makes them even more powerful.)

So, so, so good!

I learned so much, laughed so much, identified so much. Hysterical by Elissa Bassist is required reading for dismantling the white supremacist patriarchy