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Autoportrait
A work of unflinching honesty, Autoportrait is a hypnotic memoir of reflection, loss, and everyday joy from one of America’s best contemporary novelists
Jesse Ball has produced fourteen acclaimed works of deeply empathetic absurdism in poetry and fiction. Now, he offers readers his first memoir, one that showcases his “humane curiosity” (James Wood) and invites the reader into a raw and personal account of love, grief, and memory. Inspired by the memoir Édouard Levé put to paper shortly before his death, Autoportrait is an extraordinarily frank and intimate work from one of America’s most brilliant young authors.
The subtle power of Ball’s voice conjures the richness of everyday life. On each page, half-remembered moments are woven together with the joys and triumphs—and the mistakes and humiliations, too—that somehow tell us who we are, why we are here. Held at the same height as tragic accounts of illness or death are moments of startling beauty, banality, or humor: “I wake in the morning, I sit, I walk long distances. If there is somewhere to swim, I may swim. If I have a bicycle, I will ride it, especially to meet someone. There is no more preparing for me to do, other than preparing for death, and I do that by laughing. Not laughing at death, of course. Laughing at myself.”
An extraordinary memoir that reminds us what is possible and builds to the kind of power one might feel reading Anne Carson’s Glass Essay, or Joe Brainard’s I Remember. Autoportrait will leave you feeling utterly invigorated, inspired, and a little afraid.
Jesse Ball has produced fourteen acclaimed works of deeply empathetic absurdism in poetry and fiction. Now, he offers readers his first memoir, one that showcases his “humane curiosity” (James Wood) and invites the reader into a raw and personal account of love, grief, and memory. Inspired by the memoir Édouard Levé put to paper shortly before his death, Autoportrait is an extraordinarily frank and intimate work from one of America’s most brilliant young authors.
The subtle power of Ball’s voice conjures the richness of everyday life. On each page, half-remembered moments are woven together with the joys and triumphs—and the mistakes and humiliations, too—that somehow tell us who we are, why we are here. Held at the same height as tragic accounts of illness or death are moments of startling beauty, banality, or humor: “I wake in the morning, I sit, I walk long distances. If there is somewhere to swim, I may swim. If I have a bicycle, I will ride it, especially to meet someone. There is no more preparing for me to do, other than preparing for death, and I do that by laughing. Not laughing at death, of course. Laughing at myself.”
An extraordinary memoir that reminds us what is possible and builds to the kind of power one might feel reading Anne Carson’s Glass Essay, or Joe Brainard’s I Remember. Autoportrait will leave you feeling utterly invigorated, inspired, and a little afraid.
140 pages, Hardcover
First published August 16, 2022
27 people are currently reading
2323 people want to read
About the author
Jesse Ball
32 books916 followersJesse Ball (1978-) Born in New York. The author of fourteen books, most recently, the novel How To Set a Fire and Why. His prizewinning works of absurdity have been published to acclaim in many parts of the world and translated into more than a dozen languages. The recipient of the Paris Review's Plimpton Prize, as well as fellowships from the NEA, the Heinz foundation, and others, he is on the faculty at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 79 reviews
December 26, 2022
Als er een prijs bestond voor de onvergelijkelijkste schrijver, kaapte Jesse Ball hem wellicht weg. Of je hem nu kafkaiaans, absurdistisch, experimenteel noemt dan wel onderbrengt in het new weird-hokje: helemaal juist is het nooit. Zijn romans bespelen uiteenlopende thema’s en vertellen telkens weer heel andere verhalen, maar ze zijn zonder uitzondering bezwerend en bevreemdend. In het magistrale, nog niet vertaalde ‘A Cure for Suicide’ wordt het geheugen van suïcidale mensen gewist, zodat ze hun levens van nul af aan kunnen beginnen. In de postmoderne thriller ‘Sinds het zwijgen begon’ onderzoekt een journalist genaamd Jesse Ball mysterieuze verdwijningen in een Japans dorp. De dystopische parabel ‘Het duikersspel’ schetst een samenleving die zo radicaal gesegregeerd is dat de rijke klasse ongestraft minderwaardige burgers mag vermoorden.
In het pas verschenen ‘Zelfportret’ toont de 39-jarige Amerikaan zich nog maar eens een heel andere schrijver. In navolging van Edouard Levé (‘Autoportrait’) en de cultklassieker ‘Ik herinner me’ van Joe Brainard, die eerder dit jaar in het Nederlands verscheen, brengt Ball een versplinterde autobiografie van 120 bladzijden. Het boek heeft geen hoofdstukken, alinea’s of witregels en zet de klassieke memoir op zijn kop. Niet alleen kindertijd, huwelijk, werk, ouderschap, afscheid en andere traditionele mijlpalen bepalen een mensenleven. Ook allerlei feitjes, bevindingen, bedenkingen en waarnemingen maken het tot wat het is. Zonder nadruk of ordening geeft Ball alles hetzelfde gewicht. Een korte anekdote over hoe kleine Jesse bijna in een moeras wegzonk, wordt gevolgd door: ‘Bij het koken gebruik ik graag kruiden.’ Belangwekkende gebeurtenissen schetsen de contouren, maar juist de overvloed aan details geeft kleur aan zijn karakter: hij staat als enige niet recht bij een volkslied, hangt graag uit een hoog raam, verheugt zich op het vervagen van zijn tatoeages, vindt muziekinstrumenten de mooiste dingen die de mens ooit heeft gemaakt.
Uit honderden van die niemendalletjes rijst uiteindelijk, langzaam en fragmentarisch, Balls persoonlijkheid op: een paria die onverschrokken én bedeesd is, destructief én creatief, een fantasierijke zonderling die bewonderend naar het allerkleinste kan kijken terwijl hij gruwt van de wereld. Een vat vol tegenstrijdigheden dus, helemaal in lijn met de cursus die hij doceert aan de School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Die heet ‘Lying, Ambiguity, Dreaming, and Walking’. Ball spoort zijn studenten aan zichzelf voortdurend tegen te spreken. Zo zien ze de wereld elke keer weer als nieuw.
‘Zelfportret’ is in één dag geschreven, heeft Ball beweerd in een interview. Het goede, het slechte, het banale en het belangrijke van die ene dag is in dit boek terechtgekomen. Had hij dit ‘Zelfportret’ op een ander moment neergepend, dan had het er helemaal anders uitgezien. De landkaart van de geest hertekent zich immers voortdurend en toont elke dag weer andere gebieden. De grootste en spannendste verdienste van dit ‘Zelfportret’ is dat Ball je laat inzien dat je elke dag een compleet andere autobiografie zou kunnen schrijven, die even waar is als alle andere.
Het zwakste punt? Truman Capote verweet snelschrijver Jack Kerouac ooit: ‘That’s not writing, that’s typing.’ Wie Balls gedenkschrift leest, heeft soms precies dat gevoel. Door het rappe schrijfwerk en de nevenschikking van alle details ligt verveling al eens op de loer. Toch is ‘Zelfportret’ een fascinerende, moedige en doodeerlijke memoir waarmee Ball nog maar eens de grenzen van een genre oprekt. Om het met één van zijn gedachtekronkels te zeggen: ‘De beste uitspraak over boeken is gewoon de aansporing: ga dit lezen’. Inderdaad.
****
https://www.humo.be/achter-het-nieuws...
In het pas verschenen ‘Zelfportret’ toont de 39-jarige Amerikaan zich nog maar eens een heel andere schrijver. In navolging van Edouard Levé (‘Autoportrait’) en de cultklassieker ‘Ik herinner me’ van Joe Brainard, die eerder dit jaar in het Nederlands verscheen, brengt Ball een versplinterde autobiografie van 120 bladzijden. Het boek heeft geen hoofdstukken, alinea’s of witregels en zet de klassieke memoir op zijn kop. Niet alleen kindertijd, huwelijk, werk, ouderschap, afscheid en andere traditionele mijlpalen bepalen een mensenleven. Ook allerlei feitjes, bevindingen, bedenkingen en waarnemingen maken het tot wat het is. Zonder nadruk of ordening geeft Ball alles hetzelfde gewicht. Een korte anekdote over hoe kleine Jesse bijna in een moeras wegzonk, wordt gevolgd door: ‘Bij het koken gebruik ik graag kruiden.’ Belangwekkende gebeurtenissen schetsen de contouren, maar juist de overvloed aan details geeft kleur aan zijn karakter: hij staat als enige niet recht bij een volkslied, hangt graag uit een hoog raam, verheugt zich op het vervagen van zijn tatoeages, vindt muziekinstrumenten de mooiste dingen die de mens ooit heeft gemaakt.
Uit honderden van die niemendalletjes rijst uiteindelijk, langzaam en fragmentarisch, Balls persoonlijkheid op: een paria die onverschrokken én bedeesd is, destructief én creatief, een fantasierijke zonderling die bewonderend naar het allerkleinste kan kijken terwijl hij gruwt van de wereld. Een vat vol tegenstrijdigheden dus, helemaal in lijn met de cursus die hij doceert aan de School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Die heet ‘Lying, Ambiguity, Dreaming, and Walking’. Ball spoort zijn studenten aan zichzelf voortdurend tegen te spreken. Zo zien ze de wereld elke keer weer als nieuw.
‘Zelfportret’ is in één dag geschreven, heeft Ball beweerd in een interview. Het goede, het slechte, het banale en het belangrijke van die ene dag is in dit boek terechtgekomen. Had hij dit ‘Zelfportret’ op een ander moment neergepend, dan had het er helemaal anders uitgezien. De landkaart van de geest hertekent zich immers voortdurend en toont elke dag weer andere gebieden. De grootste en spannendste verdienste van dit ‘Zelfportret’ is dat Ball je laat inzien dat je elke dag een compleet andere autobiografie zou kunnen schrijven, die even waar is als alle andere.
Het zwakste punt? Truman Capote verweet snelschrijver Jack Kerouac ooit: ‘That’s not writing, that’s typing.’ Wie Balls gedenkschrift leest, heeft soms precies dat gevoel. Door het rappe schrijfwerk en de nevenschikking van alle details ligt verveling al eens op de loer. Toch is ‘Zelfportret’ een fascinerende, moedige en doodeerlijke memoir waarmee Ball nog maar eens de grenzen van een genre oprekt. Om het met één van zijn gedachtekronkels te zeggen: ‘De beste uitspraak over boeken is gewoon de aansporing: ga dit lezen’. Inderdaad.
****
https://www.humo.be/achter-het-nieuws...
Want to read
December 26, 2021Curious to read more from Jesse Ball. Also his backlog of unpublished works on his website looks very tempting, still lots to come apparently: http://www.jesseball.com/
Want to read
December 21, 2021Okay, now my 2022 has already been saved - thanks, Jesse Ball!!
August 28, 2022
I read somewhere that Jesse Ball wrote this in just one day! Reading it it's almost as if he's trying to sum up everything he ever did/thought/felt in his life; fast en short bits without space in between. It could make for a boring experience, but strangely it doesn't at all. It felt more as if Ball and I were having a coffee together and he was holding one, long monologue that I was afraid to interrupt. And I was fascinated and intrigued. It's a strange book, but it worked for me.
June 6, 2025
Ova knjiga je napisana na tabletu, a ja tekst pišem na mobilnom. Džesi Bol ju je pisao jedan dan, ja sam je čitao mnogo dana. Obojica smo čitali Eduara Levea i jasno je da je njegov uticaj ovde presudan, što je istaknuto u uvodnoj napomeni. Ipak, ovo je daleko više od omaža ili podražavanja. Odavno me neka knjiga nije tako obuzela i iznenadila. I nije to do nesvakidašnjeg talenta, već izuzetne percepcije i (ne)selektivnosti.
Srodno performansu Marine Abramović 'Oslobađanje memorije' iz 1975. godine, gde bez prestanka kazuje reči koje joj prve padaju na pamet, Bol piše hipnotički silovito o svojim malim i velikim sećanjima. Ova neizbrušena forma, gde je svaka naredna rečenica iznenađenje, verodostojnija je od geometrije autobiografije. On ne piše da bi zasenio ili da bi sebe predstavio kao instituciju, već da zauzme poziciju koja je između, a koja je toliko životna i prava, da pogađa u centar. Ova bujica u jednom pasusu čini se prisnom, dirljivom i u svojoj tobožnjoj apsurdnosti ljudskija i smislenija od većine onoga što se danas tako predstavlja.
Ali osim dirljivog otvaranja i poverenja u čitaoca i književnost, ovde je prisutna i jedna nekalkulantska spremnost da se ne bude korektan, da se razočara. Ovo stoga nije autoportret ni heroja ni antiheroja, nego nemetaforična seizmografija životnih udara, u kojoj ima mesta za sva meandriranja i koja opčinjavaju pronicljivošću koja vodi i do neudobnosti i razoružavajuće emotivnosti.
Ovo je, takođe, i proza usamljenika u ovom i svakom drugom svetu, ali da je drukčije, ne bi valjalo. Svako ko je zaista u osami, sa svetom je u dosluhu kakav nemaju oni koji nisu. A sam možeš da budeš i na krcatom stadionu, kao što možeš biti u društvu u kolibi. Pogled upućen pticama na kraju knjige najbolje govori kom carstvou pripada Bol.
A kad smo već kod b/Bola, ima ovde i zbunjivanja, dirljivosti, osuda, humora, pa i, usudiću se reći, za američke uslove nesvakidašnje uspele filozofske osvešćenosti. Sam autor je govorio o tome u jednom intervjuu, tako da svako ko misli da klevetim američke kolege, neka potraži šta je rekao. Iz jurnjave za književnim hamburgerima i bestseler bombama, promiču nam ovakvi divni i neudobni momenti.
Srodno performansu Marine Abramović 'Oslobađanje memorije' iz 1975. godine, gde bez prestanka kazuje reči koje joj prve padaju na pamet, Bol piše hipnotički silovito o svojim malim i velikim sećanjima. Ova neizbrušena forma, gde je svaka naredna rečenica iznenađenje, verodostojnija je od geometrije autobiografije. On ne piše da bi zasenio ili da bi sebe predstavio kao instituciju, već da zauzme poziciju koja je između, a koja je toliko životna i prava, da pogađa u centar. Ova bujica u jednom pasusu čini se prisnom, dirljivom i u svojoj tobožnjoj apsurdnosti ljudskija i smislenija od većine onoga što se danas tako predstavlja.
Ali osim dirljivog otvaranja i poverenja u čitaoca i književnost, ovde je prisutna i jedna nekalkulantska spremnost da se ne bude korektan, da se razočara. Ovo stoga nije autoportret ni heroja ni antiheroja, nego nemetaforična seizmografija životnih udara, u kojoj ima mesta za sva meandriranja i koja opčinjavaju pronicljivošću koja vodi i do neudobnosti i razoružavajuće emotivnosti.
Ovo je, takođe, i proza usamljenika u ovom i svakom drugom svetu, ali da je drukčije, ne bi valjalo. Svako ko je zaista u osami, sa svetom je u dosluhu kakav nemaju oni koji nisu. A sam možeš da budeš i na krcatom stadionu, kao što možeš biti u društvu u kolibi. Pogled upućen pticama na kraju knjige najbolje govori kom carstvou pripada Bol.
A kad smo već kod b/Bola, ima ovde i zbunjivanja, dirljivosti, osuda, humora, pa i, usudiću se reći, za američke uslove nesvakidašnje uspele filozofske osvešćenosti. Sam autor je govorio o tome u jednom intervjuu, tako da svako ko misli da klevetim američke kolege, neka potraži šta je rekao. Iz jurnjave za književnim hamburgerima i bestseler bombama, promiču nam ovakvi divni i neudobni momenti.
November 16, 2022
I've never read Édouard Levé's memoirs. This reminds me of Joe Brainard's I Remember, but with no paragraph breaks. (Sigh.)
If I didn't love so many of Ball's earlier books, I would not have made it very far. But I did find myself warming up to the quirky, self-deprecatory anecdotes and insightful observations. This for example summarizes a lot of what I love about Ball's writing:
If I didn't love so many of Ball's earlier books, I would not have made it very far. But I did find myself warming up to the quirky, self-deprecatory anecdotes and insightful observations. This for example summarizes a lot of what I love about Ball's writing:
There is a confusion between myself and the literary world about what should constitute a text. I believe (along with many other writers historically) that a text should be elusive, and that the act of reading a text should make the reader conscious of the life they are living. That is, the text should overflow its borders, demonstrating the complicity of our consciousness with the coloring of our surroundings and the supposed sequentiality of events. To write texts this way, one must stop prior to the point of total explanation.
August 28, 2022
Jesse Ball is an absurdist who teaches writing in an art school so he can get away with this.
An autoportrait is an artist’s portrait of himself. In this case it’s an intentional imitation of Édouard Revé’s Autoportrait. Apparently there’s no requirement to make an autoportrait interesting or coherent, which would speed things along. Ball wrote this book in a day. Revé was 39 when he wrote his book; Ball is 39 when he writes his. Readers of Revé will hope that Jesse stops there.
Still, art is art. Spurious alchemy? Stuff collected and curated in a gallery becomes art because that is what we look to see. Usually a sensate stream of words about oneself is a journal, boring, but typeset in a pink book of high concept it becomes prose poetry. Stuff leaps out. Rambling radiance.
Inevitably (for anyone who’s ever read Joe Brainard) Ball’s book evokes I Remember. Brainard used anaphora to structure his recollections, each adventitious entry beginning with “I remember” like an incantation. Ball spares us the paragraphs; we get one uninterrupted stream of thoughts. At times it was a bit like being trapped on a flight from San Francisco to Chicago in front of the guy who’s going to use the entire trip to share his story with the polite person next to him.
At other times, as often as every two or three pages, some random passage would hop out. We readers are conditioned to read stories in almost any sentence, the way artists can’t help but see patterns in clouds or stains on walls. Ball is aware of this predilection and warns us against it. “I don’t believe books are about anything.” (His have been translated into more than twenty languages; maybe absurdists are easy to translate.) While you might be tempted to read Autoportrait as an essay in the tradition of Montaigne, who makes himself his subject, or as yet another memoir in which the author shapes himself to a redemptive arc, Ball is ready to knock that expectation aside. “In essence, the time writing is no different from the time shitting.”
Don’t take him at his word because the next word will contradict it. He likes that too. No point explaining things. To understand a painting you have to look at it. To understand a book you have to read it. Ekphrasis (a good word to pair with anaphora) is pointless.
It is an interesting thing about a good book that almost nothing is ever substantively said about it, nothing written, nothing said, that is worth attending to. The best speech about books is just the injunction: read this one. If the person who speaks it is remarkable, perhaps the book will be so.
So I’m saying: read this one. Am I remarkable? I’ve told you what I can.
You can read Autoportrait in one go. It took me three. At points I felt it was aleatoric ambiance, assembled at random for anyone to experience. Everything is recollected. Nothing leads anywhere. Art as nature morte. At other times, and finally, I am content with the book as it is. Last week I read No Land in Sight: Poems by Charles Simic. Poem after poem I kept thinking: hmm, nothing here. Another poem about something that is nothing. I keep reading and that nothing holds on, becomes poetry, something mysterious, the world as we find it, astonishing.
But no sequels, please.
An autoportrait is an artist’s portrait of himself. In this case it’s an intentional imitation of Édouard Revé’s Autoportrait. Apparently there’s no requirement to make an autoportrait interesting or coherent, which would speed things along. Ball wrote this book in a day. Revé was 39 when he wrote his book; Ball is 39 when he writes his. Readers of Revé will hope that Jesse stops there.
Still, art is art. Spurious alchemy? Stuff collected and curated in a gallery becomes art because that is what we look to see. Usually a sensate stream of words about oneself is a journal, boring, but typeset in a pink book of high concept it becomes prose poetry. Stuff leaps out. Rambling radiance.
Inevitably (for anyone who’s ever read Joe Brainard) Ball’s book evokes I Remember. Brainard used anaphora to structure his recollections, each adventitious entry beginning with “I remember” like an incantation. Ball spares us the paragraphs; we get one uninterrupted stream of thoughts. At times it was a bit like being trapped on a flight from San Francisco to Chicago in front of the guy who’s going to use the entire trip to share his story with the polite person next to him.
At other times, as often as every two or three pages, some random passage would hop out. We readers are conditioned to read stories in almost any sentence, the way artists can’t help but see patterns in clouds or stains on walls. Ball is aware of this predilection and warns us against it. “I don’t believe books are about anything.” (His have been translated into more than twenty languages; maybe absurdists are easy to translate.) While you might be tempted to read Autoportrait as an essay in the tradition of Montaigne, who makes himself his subject, or as yet another memoir in which the author shapes himself to a redemptive arc, Ball is ready to knock that expectation aside. “In essence, the time writing is no different from the time shitting.”
Don’t take him at his word because the next word will contradict it. He likes that too. No point explaining things. To understand a painting you have to look at it. To understand a book you have to read it. Ekphrasis (a good word to pair with anaphora) is pointless.
It is an interesting thing about a good book that almost nothing is ever substantively said about it, nothing written, nothing said, that is worth attending to. The best speech about books is just the injunction: read this one. If the person who speaks it is remarkable, perhaps the book will be so.
So I’m saying: read this one. Am I remarkable? I’ve told you what I can.
You can read Autoportrait in one go. It took me three. At points I felt it was aleatoric ambiance, assembled at random for anyone to experience. Everything is recollected. Nothing leads anywhere. Art as nature morte. At other times, and finally, I am content with the book as it is. Last week I read No Land in Sight: Poems by Charles Simic. Poem after poem I kept thinking: hmm, nothing here. Another poem about something that is nothing. I keep reading and that nothing holds on, becomes poetry, something mysterious, the world as we find it, astonishing.
But no sequels, please.
June 23, 2025
4.5/5
This is written so matter-of-fact and with such dry wit, I found it strangely relatable and thoroughly enjoyable. The audiobook’s expertly narrated by James Patrick Cronin and his delivery is wonderfully deadpan. This is a novel I’d read a second time, which I don’t often do, but it’s a quick and fun read. Oddly enough, Ball’s “Autoportrait” is somewhat of an echo chamber for me. Reading it feels akin to curling up inside a security blanket, perfectly opportune during these unsettling times.
This is written so matter-of-fact and with such dry wit, I found it strangely relatable and thoroughly enjoyable. The audiobook’s expertly narrated by James Patrick Cronin and his delivery is wonderfully deadpan. This is a novel I’d read a second time, which I don’t often do, but it’s a quick and fun read. Oddly enough, Ball’s “Autoportrait” is somewhat of an echo chamber for me. Reading it feels akin to curling up inside a security blanket, perfectly opportune during these unsettling times.
June 5, 2024
Malo remek delo, umetnosti smatranja, naivno - iskrenog gledanja na svet pomešanog sa tokom svesti. Nepretenciozno i pametno.
October 2, 2024
2.5 stars // Very easy and very hard to read at the same time. I went back and forth between judging the author as a psychopath or very human or both.
July 31, 2022
My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Catapult, Counterpoint Press and Soft Skull Press for an advance copy of this new memoir and examination of a life.
A very good friend of mine is a writer who has collaborated on quite a few bestselling memoirs from singers, actors, and others tossed in the limelight of the public eye. The writer once told me that people to talk about their lives, but writing it down makes it more real. Something politicians understand. To write is to go deeper, to explore as the writer explains and leaving a physical reminder to be examined later. Few people want to go that far. Great achievements, goals, getting back at family or enemies, that's easy, deep truth, the whole truth and the minutiae of moments that make up a life that is very hard. Author, absurdist, teacher Jesse Ball has gone that deep in his new work, a memoir entitled Autoportrait, about the life and thoughts of Jesse Ball, or an amazing piece of fiction, again about the author Jesse Ball.
As quoted by the publishers, this book is inspired by the memoir of the French author Édouad Levé, written before his committed suicide at the age of 39. Ball is the same age when he starts this he writes and from there he writes about his life as it seems to pop into his head. We begin with a list of childhood injuries ranging from various accidents, across his childhood. Where in other books this might mean some reflection, we have no time here, a life is being lived. Soon the reader learns about Jesse Ball's tattoos, marriages, travel on trains in China, judo, fights, anger, lost books and reading in the bath, and some titles that he recommends to try also.
The book once started is very hard to put down. The book is small, but dense, with much to contemplate, and frankly go oh come on at. However this is his life, we are just observing and as readers who are we to judge. I would say that the writing seems improvisational, like a jam band solo that seems to go nowhere however as you go on you find themes, and things that look like long lists of likes and dislikes fit into ways that enhance the reading experience. At the end I knew more about Jesse Ball than about members of my own family, for good and bad. And I have more appreciation of what it takes to be human. Thousands of little bits, significant and insignificant but equally up into a life, well lived, or not well lived readers might have to decide, but lived.
Not a book for everyone. This is my second book by Mr. Ball, I read his novel Census, and have another on my to be read pile, which I will have to move up. I really enjoyed this, the idea, the honesty, the times that we had something in common, and the times that we were diametrically apart. A book for people who like to read different. For fans of the recent book The Novelist by Jordan Castro, also from the same publisher, and just as good and different or for other fans of autofiction such as Emmanuel Carrère.
A very good friend of mine is a writer who has collaborated on quite a few bestselling memoirs from singers, actors, and others tossed in the limelight of the public eye. The writer once told me that people to talk about their lives, but writing it down makes it more real. Something politicians understand. To write is to go deeper, to explore as the writer explains and leaving a physical reminder to be examined later. Few people want to go that far. Great achievements, goals, getting back at family or enemies, that's easy, deep truth, the whole truth and the minutiae of moments that make up a life that is very hard. Author, absurdist, teacher Jesse Ball has gone that deep in his new work, a memoir entitled Autoportrait, about the life and thoughts of Jesse Ball, or an amazing piece of fiction, again about the author Jesse Ball.
As quoted by the publishers, this book is inspired by the memoir of the French author Édouad Levé, written before his committed suicide at the age of 39. Ball is the same age when he starts this he writes and from there he writes about his life as it seems to pop into his head. We begin with a list of childhood injuries ranging from various accidents, across his childhood. Where in other books this might mean some reflection, we have no time here, a life is being lived. Soon the reader learns about Jesse Ball's tattoos, marriages, travel on trains in China, judo, fights, anger, lost books and reading in the bath, and some titles that he recommends to try also.
The book once started is very hard to put down. The book is small, but dense, with much to contemplate, and frankly go oh come on at. However this is his life, we are just observing and as readers who are we to judge. I would say that the writing seems improvisational, like a jam band solo that seems to go nowhere however as you go on you find themes, and things that look like long lists of likes and dislikes fit into ways that enhance the reading experience. At the end I knew more about Jesse Ball than about members of my own family, for good and bad. And I have more appreciation of what it takes to be human. Thousands of little bits, significant and insignificant but equally up into a life, well lived, or not well lived readers might have to decide, but lived.
Not a book for everyone. This is my second book by Mr. Ball, I read his novel Census, and have another on my to be read pile, which I will have to move up. I really enjoyed this, the idea, the honesty, the times that we had something in common, and the times that we were diametrically apart. A book for people who like to read different. For fans of the recent book The Novelist by Jordan Castro, also from the same publisher, and just as good and different or for other fans of autofiction such as Emmanuel Carrère.
September 7, 2022
Autoportrait by Jesse Ball is a great memoir! This book is inspired by Autoportrait by Édouard Levé and I really enjoyed the writing style. I listened to the audiobook narrated by James Patrick Cronin and he did an excellent job! This is my first book by this author and I learned a lot about him. This book is honest as he shares his likes, dislikes, bits of his everyday life and moments from his childhood. It was especially interesting to learn about his writing practices. I’m curious to read some of this author’s poetry now!
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Thank you to HighBridge Audio via NetGalley for my ALC!
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Thank you to HighBridge Audio via NetGalley for my ALC!
August 21, 2022
Absolutely beautiful. I love Jesse Ball’s work, and this was incredible.
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September 7, 2022We get it you’re not like other girls
December 4, 2024
Finalmente llegó el día en el que un libro de Jesse Ball me resultó una reverenda poronga.
October 16, 2022
Fun, playful book that is meant for a one-sitting experience. Obviously, Édouard Levé's shadow is all over this, but I still found it an enjoyable and sometimes provocative read.
February 7, 2023
Moeilijk om te beoordelen, omdat het zo willekeurig en ultrapersoonlijk is. Ik vond het boek van Edouard Levé harder binnenkomen. Zou het niet fijn zijn als elke auteur op zijn 39ste zo'n boek neerschrijft, een hele verzameling autoportretten? Kreeg er wel zin van om Jesse Balls oeuvre dieper te gaan verkennen.
August 25, 2022
An interesting view of one’s identity. Entertaining, painful, an funny. It feels written in one breath, there are no chapters or paragraphs. It starts and then ends.
Here are some of my favorite excerpts:
“It is my feeling that the human race is not fundamentally important.”
“I have always been happy to be young. Now that I am beginning to be old, I am happy to be old, too.”
“There is no more preparing for me to do, other than preparing for death, and I do that by laughing”.
All in all I enjoyed this book for its different approach, humor, and openness.
Thank you, Goodreads Giveaways and Catapult publishing for providing me with this hardcover!
Here are some of my favorite excerpts:
“It is my feeling that the human race is not fundamentally important.”
“I have always been happy to be young. Now that I am beginning to be old, I am happy to be old, too.”
“There is no more preparing for me to do, other than preparing for death, and I do that by laughing”.
All in all I enjoyed this book for its different approach, humor, and openness.
Thank you, Goodreads Giveaways and Catapult publishing for providing me with this hardcover!
July 23, 2022
It's All Good.........
This could be Jesse Ball's actual true autobiography, or it could be the might as well be true biography of a character created by Jesse Ball who happens to be named Jesse Ball. If you don't see this distinction as being much of a distinction at all, then you will likely enjoy this book.
I noted above that "it's all good". That is not true. The book is, more or less, log-normal. There are some misses, lots of solid bits, and a few amazingly engaging bits. Some lines are too coy or contrived; some are astonishing or even heartbreaking. Since the entire text is one continuing paragraph, and almost no thought is entertained beyond at most a few sentences, the use of the word "bits" seems quite appropriate.
I enjoy and admire Ball's fiction. I enjoyed and admired this.
(Please note that I received a free ecopy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)
This could be Jesse Ball's actual true autobiography, or it could be the might as well be true biography of a character created by Jesse Ball who happens to be named Jesse Ball. If you don't see this distinction as being much of a distinction at all, then you will likely enjoy this book.
I noted above that "it's all good". That is not true. The book is, more or less, log-normal. There are some misses, lots of solid bits, and a few amazingly engaging bits. Some lines are too coy or contrived; some are astonishing or even heartbreaking. Since the entire text is one continuing paragraph, and almost no thought is entertained beyond at most a few sentences, the use of the word "bits" seems quite appropriate.
I enjoy and admire Ball's fiction. I enjoyed and admired this.
(Please note that I received a free ecopy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)
December 7, 2022
Maybe the mistake is that I listened to it on audiobook—the first thirty minutes sounds like a guy you’re trapped talking to at a party where you don’t know anyone else? And the next thirty minutes are you still trapped with this guy but at least you’re coming to terms with it. I think there are sentences in here that are gems, but not pages. Maybe his poetry is better? There was like one line where he said “most people don’t like my work” and I’m like hm wonder why
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August 30, 2022This book is fine. The biggest question I have for the author is how he believes his account differs meaningfully from that of Leve’s. The original autoportrait is a startling and often unconnected series of statements that appear as facts. Ball’s autoportrait is actually much more biographical, and his statements read not only more factual, but linked together. There is less mystery in what binds one statement to the next, as the author makes it clear that he is telling a larger narrative. Like Ball, I too love Leve’s autoportrait, and while I admire his personal recreation, I don’t think it distinguishes itself enough from the original to make it feel as novel or poignant. I don’t hate it, but it feels to me as if this has already been done, because it has, and I wish he were more bold about attempting a new approach or spin to his version.
At times, the author’s personal details come across with arrogance. From the personal details that he reveals, particularly the instance where he decides as a child to unplug his brother from life support, I thought “this could be a memoir in itself”. Instead, the autoportrait technique almost appears as a defensive gesture to tack away from these interesting details towards banal details that make these weightier moments feel like oversharing.
At times, the author’s personal details come across with arrogance. From the personal details that he reveals, particularly the instance where he decides as a child to unplug his brother from life support, I thought “this could be a memoir in itself”. Instead, the autoportrait technique almost appears as a defensive gesture to tack away from these interesting details towards banal details that make these weightier moments feel like oversharing.
March 6, 2023
At turns hilarious, and insightful, this book is unlike anything I’ve ever read —and FULL of lines I couldn’t help but underline. As I haven’t read the book that inspired Ball to write this memoir, I’m not sure if the way in which he structured it —no paragraph breaks or chapters— mimicked that of Édouard Levé’s Autoportrait or if it was just the catalyst for what became his own version.
Either way, I found this to be a thoroughly original format, which gave insight into how complex Ball’s mind can be; complex and also seemingly random.
Examples include, “I sometimes think that not enough information about toiletry, the wiping of asses, is shared. I feel someone must have a technique that is substantially better than the usual method. I am curious about what that is.”
and “When pets or children do things that don’t make sense, I look around for a plausible explanation.”
or “In essence, the time writing is no different from the time shitting.”
This was not the first book I read by him, but it was the first I finished, a fact that if he read this review, would likely not surprise or even affect him.
“The work I do is not popular because it is absurd and because only gross generalizations of the absurd, like Dali’s, are popular.”
Well, Mr. Ball consider me a fan. And you’d definitely murder me at chess.
Either way, I found this to be a thoroughly original format, which gave insight into how complex Ball’s mind can be; complex and also seemingly random.
Examples include, “I sometimes think that not enough information about toiletry, the wiping of asses, is shared. I feel someone must have a technique that is substantially better than the usual method. I am curious about what that is.”
and “When pets or children do things that don’t make sense, I look around for a plausible explanation.”
or “In essence, the time writing is no different from the time shitting.”
This was not the first book I read by him, but it was the first I finished, a fact that if he read this review, would likely not surprise or even affect him.
“The work I do is not popular because it is absurd and because only gross generalizations of the absurd, like Dali’s, are popular.”
Well, Mr. Ball consider me a fan. And you’d definitely murder me at chess.
December 23, 2022
A life is composed of odd moments, attributes, proclivities. Jesse Ball's certainly is. His Autoportrait is a stream, a single paragraph in which one thing runs into another. The title design is as if the words were drawn without lifting pencil from paper, the sense the book offers. There is evidence that the book was written in a single day, at a residency at John Grisham's place in Mississippi, though that isn't among the countless details in the body of the book. We do learn, however, of his love of throwing things off of tall buildings, his body's rebellion, his way with lovers. Generally, what a weirdo he happens to be. Like all of us if we were to recount one detail after the next. It is the kind of book that inspires you to follow the form, just as Ball was by reading Edouard Leve's book of the same title. And I think I might engage the exercise as well. This book is generative in its flow.
January 23, 2025
Una autobiografía escrita en un solo día, en una sentada. Siento que acabo de conocer a un tipo muy raro que no tiene problema de serlo.
October 4, 2025
Perfect book at the right time.
Being a lover of abstract art, this book made me think of cringing when I hear someone say “I could do that”
Being a lover of abstract art, this book made me think of cringing when I hear someone say “I could do that”
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February 22, 2023This book pissed me off a hundred times, but dag gummit if it ain’t an engaging reading experience.
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December 5, 2022excellent! read in one sitting
December 17, 2022
Hard to peg this man down. Reading this unfiltered self portrait gave me the impression that a human's character is more like moving water than something that is static and described definitively.
I like that, to some extent, the ideas presented in this book are out of step with current cultural mores and modes of thinking. At times a voice in my mind judged what I was reading. I had to take a second look at these judgments, and ask where they came from, what purpose they served.
I like that, to some extent, the ideas presented in this book are out of step with current cultural mores and modes of thinking. At times a voice in my mind judged what I was reading. I had to take a second look at these judgments, and ask where they came from, what purpose they served.
January 2, 2023
This was simply one of my favorite books of the year. It is about nothing and everything all at once. A stream of consciousness feel that is full of beautifully written prose and sentences flow into the next as a string of subjects that unfold chapter-less like a life does. It does not drag and it does not outstay it’s welcome. It is a near perfect work of which more memoirists should seek to replicate.
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