Kate Zambreno's new book beautifully weaves together many interrelated threads into a prismatic and often poetically charged narrative that explores the body, womanhood/motherhood, illnesses both individual and societal, and what it means to "write" and/or "write through" the body.

She covers a lot of ground here, centrally focusing on Herve Guibert and his writing of the body, particularly his own body living with AIDS. She interleaves this with a diaristic chronicling of her difficult second pregnancy, which overlaps with the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic and New York's lockdown in March/April 2020.

I found Zambreno's discussions of "autofiction" (both via Guibert and via her own work) particularly interesting - the ways our fictionalized selves can both resemble us and become our avatars, taking on characteristics beyond the scope of our off-the-page lives.

Thanks to Columbia University Press and NetGalley for the ARC!

This really defines categorisation; it's a mimetic piece of autofiction that thinks through Herve Guibert's own famous piece of autofiction, 'To The Friend Who Did Not Save My Life.' Theoretically grounded, it places with Barthes and Foucault, Kristeva and Mary Douglas; entirely personal, it dissects the writer's body and friendships, running analogously alongside (and against) its analysis of Guibert's own dissection of his body and friendships as he died of AIDs. It meditates on the death of the author, both figurative and literal; on how one writes when one is soon to be, or already, dead, on posthumous publication, on the problems of writing as a living writer about the living. I had difficulty putting a name to the genre Zambreno was using, but I was thoroughly delighted by the tangle of thought, theory, confession, literary criticism and memoir.

A beautiful, erudite exploration of writing and parenthood. With far-ranging references to the works and lives of the likes of Baudelaire and Foucault, Zambreno examines what it means to write and to attempt to live a life of the mind in the midst of life's complexities. Wonderful, thought-provoking, and unexpected, a must-read for anyone attempting art in the midst of intense familial obligations.

A wonderful and brilliantly written meditation on illness and the body, as well as on friendship and alienation. It's interesting to read this book in context of her recent book Drifts, as I feel like this book is a kind of ghost book to that one, circling around similar themes and kind of written in that book's shadow (like her book Appendix Project is written in the shadow of her Book of Mutter). There's something very interesting that Zambreno is doing with these books on books, or books inside of books, all coming out of her own very prolific life-writing practice.

I have been a Kate Zambreno fan since I read GREEN GIRL and found the expat experience so eerily similar to mine, I knew I would read whatever else she had written. After DRIFTS came out during 2020, I assumed it would be a while since we got a new book. Incorrect. TO WRITE AS IF ALREADY DEAD was started pre-COVID but has been contextualised in the pandemic which, frustratingly, makes it incredibly relevant and incredibly tiresome.

Zambreno writes what is often described by others as auto-fiction, although rarely does a writer of this genre describe their work this way. In TO WRITE AS IF ALREADY DEAD, Kate has a young child and is pregnant and finds herself researching the French writer and photographer Herve Guibert. Zambreno frequently describes and assess her life in relation to other artists but I think this time I was covid-exhuasted and reading a women go on and on about being pregnant and how difficult that is, when I know in DRIFTS her ambivalence towards being a mother ran rampant throughout the book, was tedious.

I found myself reflecting on my own experiences often but was pulled back into a 2020 pandemic world which, look, maybe I am just not ready to fully explore. Regardless, Zamrbeno is always worth reading, even if this one didn't hit the spot like the previous books mentioned and the stunning SCREEN TESTS.

Thanks to Net Galley, Columbia University Press and Kate Zambreno for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

2 stars — for the author’s efforts

At the risk of outing myself as a total philistine when it comes to literature (which I don’t believe I am), I mostly (well, more than mostly, nearly totally) disliked this book. The author strikes me as a whining mother, who never seems able to grasp happiness no matter what she is doing. Plus that, she’s nearly always suffering from some physical malady (general malaise, shingles, you name it). But, then, is this book supposed to be about her … or is supposed to be about the French photographer/author Herve Guibert. Guibert died in 1991 of AIDS.

The book is written in two parts. The first part is the story of Guibert told in a roundabout way. There is nothing straight forward about this book. It’s almost like a cross between the stream of consciousness of James Joyce and a personal memoir along the lines of Styron’s “Darkness Visible.” Yes, it’s that depressing. So, Part 1 goes into mostly irrelevant (to me) details of Guibert’s life alongside the Zambreno’s life with her husband and daughter (3-year old Leo). She is struggling to complete her book about Guibert and engages in an online “relationship” with an anonymous author. This “relationship” takes up a good part of Part 1. Most of Part 1 struck me as a lofty discourse about writing, the meaning of authorship, etc., written in an esoteric manner that makes it difficult grasp — not all good literature needs to be difficult to grasp!! In fact, it seems to me that the opposite should be true. In any case, this book, at least through Part 1 did very little to engage me and I just wished for it to be finished. In fact, in Part II her editor writes to her after her submittal of a draft, “Brilliant but don’t have larger vision to publish it, etc. Need to make certain numbers.” Yep, I agree.

The second part of the book was, for me, more engaging. It relates the story of Guibert’s last year and his encounters with medical professionals, friends, acquaintances, etc. But I found myself wondering throughout, as the story took side trips to the various encounters the author had with doctors, etc. during her difficult pregnancy, a bout with shingles, etc. I understand, I think, that the purpose was for the author to immerse herself in Guibert’s life and thereby better understand and appreciate him. But it didn’t work for me … at all … I just wanted to be done with the book. I continually found myself thinking, “Why don’t I just read Guibert?” Any of the additional facts Zambreno added about his life can be found on the internet. I got tired of Zambreno repeatedly talking about her Uber-expensive “shitty” health insurance that was the only reason she continued in her adjunct professor role. OK, I get that too … but it doesn’t need to be hammered into the reader’s head. It’s this repeated whining and complaining throughout the book that, in the end, just sent me over the top leaving no sympathy for the author and just thinking … go see a therapist, get a life, quite bitching about everything, it must be miserable to be you.