I first heard of Lemn Sissay in a YouTube video. He is a poet, and I was very impressed with his eloquence and thoughtfulness. He briefly mentioned a bit about his childhood – the restrictions put on his reading by his parents, his relocation into state-run institutional homes at the age of twelve, and his discovery of Bob Marley as a voice he could relate to. So when this book came out, I wanted to learn more about his life and his experiences.
This memoir deals with Lemn’s childhood. It is told in the form of state records – mostly notes kept by social workers about how Lemn was doing and important events in his life. He then discusses his memories of those events. Lemn was born to an unwed Ethiopian mother in the 1960s. He was taken from her and put into a foster home with a white family called the Greenwoods. They called him Norman and raised him with their growing family for twelve years. But as they had more children and they all got older, tensions started to rise between Lemn and his parents. Things reached a head when he was twelve, and the family sent Lemn away to live in a children’s home. He never went back to live with his adopted family, and bounced between group homes and a detention facility until finding placement in his own apartment.
The worst part of the story, though, is that his mother wanted him. She was a young student who had to return to Ethiopia to care for an ailing family member, and she left her son in the care of the British government until she was able to bring him home. Lemn didn’t know this until his teens, when his social worker finally showed him the letter she wrote asking how to get him back. His mother was never given the opportunity to reclaim her son, and the state actually hindered her attempts by giving unreasonable deadlines for response to written communications.
This revelation, coming as it did so soon after his rejection by the only family he had ever known, the family he thought he was irrevocably a part of, caused a lot of turmoil. It took a lot of strength and determination for Lemn to make it through his teenage years and begin to build a life for himself.
The book doesn’t offer any easily satisfying resolutions. His story ends with his childhood. But what it does offer is insight into what it is like to be confronted by the prejudice, judgment, abandonment, neglect and abuse he had to deal with, and what it takes to survive. Not only survive, but maintain humanity, compassion and hope. I think this book was primarily about Lemn working through everything he learned about his background after the fact, and holding to account those who betrayed his trust – and his mother’s.
As you might expect from a poet with Lemn’s talent, the power of this book lies in how he tells his story. The facts are the facts, of course, but he takes us through the journey he took, lets us walk beside him, and guides us through what it felt like for him. It’s a difficult journey, but it is also a great gift. Not only because it allows us to understand more about a broken system and how it fails children placed in its care, but also about resilience and grace. I had to put this book down several times, and it’s one that I think might be hard for some readers. But it’s one that will leave you with a lot to consider, and I think Lemn’s story is one well worth hearing. I hope he writes a second memoir, one that shares what he has learned since, and how he has navigated life on his own terms. That’s a story I want to hear.
At the age of seventeen, after a childhood in an adopted family followed by six years in care homes, Norman Greenwood was given his birth certificate. He learned that his real name was not Norman. It was Lemn Sissay. He was British and Ethiopian. And he learned that his mother had been pleading for his safe return to her since his birth. Here Sissay recounts his life story. It is a story of neglect and determination. Misfortune and hope. Cruelty and beauty. Sissay reflects on adoption, self-expression and Britishness, and in doing so explores the institutional care system, race, family and the meaning of home. Written with all the lyricism and power you would expect from one of the nation’s best-loved voices, this moving, frank and timely memoir is the result of a life spent asking questions, and a celebration of the redemptive power of creativity. – Goodreads
Book Title: My Name Is Why
Author: Lemn Sissay
Series: No
Edition: Hardback
Published By: Canongate Books
Released: April 4, 2019
Genre: Non-Fiction, Memoir, Adoption, Family
Pages: 191
Date Read: October 30-December 9, 2019
Rating: 8/10
Average Goodreads Rating: 4.32/5 (778 ratings)