Regarding JHelsel’s comments that she was self- absobed and uncaring – you have to also realize something about Lucy Grealy which should make you take some of her comments with a grain of salt. Towards the end of her life she became very addicted to perscription painkillers from all her surgeries and the last two years of her life she was a heroin addict. I would take something someone said, no matter how brilliant, with a huge grain of salt if that was the state of mind they had come to. I think also the pain and suffering in her own life, all the surgeries she endured, the fact that it was her face that was the most disfigured thing about her, that has to wear on a person and perhaps under the influence, she was not at her best, wouldn’t you think?

Having just finished the book a few days ago, I think I agree a lttle with all the comments previouly posted. But moreover, that Ann Patchett’s portrait of Lucy Grealy is one that is understandable to any woman who has ever had an intense friendship with another woman. Sure, Lucy is one of the most self-absorbed characters ever described in literature, but she is not being portrayed as a saint, but more of a martyr, a reluctant spokesperson for the hunchbacks of the world. She was someone who plowed forward despite terrible physical deformities and pain and still managed to live a full and successful (for what she had to endure and an almost inevitable early death)life. She reminds me of Carson Mc Culler’s The Heart is a Lonely Hunter–we all want to be the beloved at some point, even the ugly and “undesirable.” Her life was a search to find someone to hold her up as precious, the reason why she reveled in her relationship with Ann and her many overly suppostive and tolerant friends and her doctors, and the same reason why she was so horribly dissappointed with her sexual partners. Lucy’s life should be a lesson for all women. Before anyone so readily criticizes her life, they should consider the full implication of what it would be like to walk in her shoes.

It is a wonder to me how severely people judge a human being who has made her work public. I suppose one may say anything one wants about work in the public sphere, but it is disheartening to see such arrogant dismissal of a writer and her grieving friend without consideration for the possibility of one’s own misinterpretation and ignorance of the lived details. For Grealy’s family and friends and Patchett’s sake, I hope they do not stumble accross this website.
I, for one, appreciated Grealy’s memoir for its literary details, personal revelations, and relevant intellectual context. I appreciated Ann Patchett’s afterword as well as her piece “The Face of Pain”.
Having watched a best friend descend into a heroin addiction for “no good reason” I’ve walked away considering myself lucky for surviving relatively unscathed, but certainly not morally or intellectually superior. Self-absorption, or what appears to others to be self-absorption, is sometimes more of a trap with room for little hope than a mere chosen vanity one can denounce with the right dose of humility.

I just finished the Patchett book also. I have read and reread Autobiography of a Face so many, many times that when I first tried to read Truth and Beauty, I thought the maybe Patchett didn’t know Grealy at all, but had cribbed her “biography” from what Grealy wrote in AOAF. I am still wondering a bit, but I’m assuming that someone must have seen them together.
I also realize that my feelings about this book are amazingly complex. Having lost a dear friend that I loved, I imagined writing a sort of “tell-all” book about her and I’m not sure if I did it would be honoring her.
I guess that’s what makes me the most uncomfortable about this book–in writing about her tremendous friendship and rivalry with Grealy, Patchett is, in a way, declaring a victory in the race “to be the success” that she and Grealy seem to have engaged in.
It reminds me of a passage in Geoffrey Wolfe’s book, Duke of Deception, where he points out that a friend of his father’s defended his father against the charge of being a Jew (back in the ’30s) thus suggesting what a good friend he had been to him, but Wolfe points out that a real friend would never have told him the story at all.

I’m so glad to have stumbled onto this discussion of Patchett/Grealy. I have to agree with much of what Cynthia said. Almost halfway through Truth and Beauty, I realized that Lucy Grealy was a self-absorbed spoiled and irresponsible person who used Ann Patchett terribly. I’m having a hard time finishing the book because of my dislike for Grealy. This book is not about friendship. It’s about self-pity and codependency. Lucy Grealy is no hero.

Grealy did go through a lot, and seeing as how most likely none of us posting have ever had to live with Ewing’s Sarcoma, we really aren’t in aposition to judge her. Maybe she could be a little selfish at times, but think about how she viewed the world. In her mind, she was the only one who truly understood her, everyone else was on the outside. Of cousre she had to look out for her own interests, is she didn’t could she really count on anyone else to? Plus, remember, one of those closest to her, Patchett, loved her dearly and didn’t think of her as selfish. I think that says something, seeing as how none of us knew her personally…

I tend to agree, to a large extent, with the folks
on this site who have leaned towards the view that
while Lucy suffered enormous physical and emotional pain in her life, she was also incredibly irresponsible and self absorbed, and her friends helped her to become this way.
Ann was her friend, yes, but also her enabler,
despite what I think were her very good intentions.
Fascinating book, I admit that I read it until
I couldn’t put it down.
This is a great website, by the way!

Amen to that sister!

I stumbled on this site and am glad I did. I haven’t heard any comments to the question Lisa asked in November. Where was her family? My mother began a series of surgeries at the age of 5 that continued until 5 years ago, with a total of over 30. She is now 85. She is strong, loving and views her pain with a view that has always been “OK, so get on with life and live it to the fullest.” I have read all of Patchett’s book, read Lucy Grealy’s autobiography and assorted articles on their relationship. I keep coming back to the impact of her family and their lives together as a source of question. My mother’s parents were with her for all surgeries, basically,”moved into the room.” Her father spent endless hours of time in physical therapy with her. She stated she never felt alone. When I read Grealy’s account of her parents leaving her alone at the hospital and her stunned reaction and then resolve that “she was alone” I wondered how that impacted her behavior of self absorbtion. That reaction made some sense to me.
As to the questions people has raised about her friends sticking with her, I look to Ann Patchett’s statements about how Lucy was one of the most vital, interesting people she had ever known. I think many of us have fallen in love with friends who are destructive, and also fastinating. I wonder if that is one of the factors that held so many of Lucy’s friends to her for so long.
In short, I have found this an interesting conversation to be part of because it resembles my experiences in life and the lives of many people I know. I have no answers only questions.

I just finished reading Truth and Beauty. I envy their friendship and admire their talent. Everything Cynthia and her like is saying is insignifcant, petty and probably petulant. Lucy undured the unbearable and still manged to write like an angel.

I came to “Truth & Beauty” in a different way than any of you — I’d read and enjoyed Patchett’s “The Magician’s Assistant” and was looking for anything else she’d written.
I am online now because I had never heard of Lucy Grealy and was suspicious that she may not have been real. Numerous authors have written fiction in the guise of a memoir, and I though this might be another case.
Now that I’ve learned otherwise, I am amazed at the way Lucy’s friends put up with her for so long. Another reaction to the novel: those of us who write for newspapers and magazines have a hard time understanding the self-destructive and time-wasting behavior of so-called serious writers in this book. Apply rear end to seat and write something, for goodness sake, or get a job as a waitress, like Patchett did.
By all accounts, Joyce Carol Oates is also fairly neurotic and depressed, and yet she writes about two novels every three year, plus poetry, literary anaysis, and articles of all types.

What an interesting site! I too am interested in meeting or writing to Ann Patchett..why?…..because I live in Aberdeen. Perhaps she would like to come and re-visit us again soon to clear up a few things?
I also knew Lucy though I suspect it will come as no suprise to those using this site that I had never heard of Ann until her book came out despite actually flatting with Lucy!
Aberdeen does not deserve the infactual description given in Truth and Beauty which in my mind is rather short on facts anyway. I can’t comment on someone elses realtionships and how they view them but Lucy had a lot of friends in Aberdeen, people were rude to her all over the world, ignorance is NOT confined to one city and this is no worse than anywhere else: and ‘we’ here who provided rather a lot of FREE medical aid to Lucy are ‘not amused’ .
AND we don’t think AP should be sent back to Aberdeen (thanks who ever wrote that), she should just come and apologize.
Bethy

It is interesting to me how all of these people calling Lucy Grealy a failure have never gone through the pain that she went through. Instead of judging what Grealy was like, why don’t people try to understand what she was trying to say about society? We are obsessed with looks and don’t allow disformed people to have happiness. How was Grealy supposed to grow up when at every turn people forced her into herself? Painkillers are among the most addictive substances in the world, and while it may be easy for people not on them to say that she should have gotten help, when you are forced to take them it is not so easy to see it that way. Her entire book was about how people judge each other, and all of you who are judging her are merely a case-in-point. “judge not lest ye be judged” is often quoted by people who stand on their Christian morals, but not used when they turn around and discredit someone like Lucy Grealy for being a “loser.”

Having read “Truth and Beauty” and all the comments, I can understand both sides. I feel that Lucy was very lucky to survive Ewings Sarcoma since the 5 year survival rate is less than 10% and many people who have this cancer will suffer metastasis to another area of the body. I wish that her friends and the medical professionals in her life would have been better at helping her celebrate her cancer survival instead of trying to “fix” her face. There are ways, short of repeated surgeries, that she could have been helped. It is a chilling example of the importance our culture places on the external.

People write for many reasons and I find it immpossible not to praise them for being vulnerable, they’ve shared their most personal thoughts with strangers, opened themselves up to critical commentary. Lucy was clearly a foiled person, filled with self-loathing and unrealized potential. Ann mothered her for her own pschological reasons and, I think, was consumed by guilt and remorse that she couldn’t/didn’t save Lucy. A complex relationship in a world of complex relations. Celebrate what a moving and thought provoking book this was and come down from your own self-defeating high horse; or stick to People magazine with it’s heroic stories of those who have beaten the odds.

Just finished Truth & Beauty, and was impressed by it as an artwork (as opposed to a set-in-stone factual analysis). By virtue of its nature this memoir was lopsided in perspective; however, it’s artful in that we feel more intimacy with the person it focuses on (Grealy) than the narrator (Patchett).
Feedback posted here and elsewhere seems to run the gamut from judgmental attacks on Grealy’s life (which seem a bit much considering she’s someone most of us didn’t know) to beatification(which also seems a bit much — considering she’s someone most of us didn’t know). I found the memoir to be a pleasing character study of someone wonderfully flawed and at times inspirational. Though I found Patchett’s Grealy to be many things — spirited, “fetching”, irritating, maddening, lovable — she was never dull. I also found the book to be a much quieter reflection of Patchett’s: on being the friend who doesn’t shine quite so bright, the mottled cardinal mated to the bright redbird. Patchett’s memories of Grealy’s vibrance are explicit, but her own feelings of never quite measuring up are implicit and ultimately what drew Ann and Lucy together for me, the shared thread that pulled them close in this book.
I don’t think Lucy Grealy would have been nearly as interesting as pure saintly accepter of disfigurement, or as a full-blown loser. It’s far more facinating to try figuring out someone who’s a concoction of both, at the same time that she’s neither.

I disagree with the comments that suggest because of Lucy’s enormous suffering it was somehow an “excuse” for spoiled behavior, insensitive comments, and drug addiction. Not so. There are many people in life who suffer though enormous pain but don’t resort to becoming an emotional vampire and sucking the life out of everyone around her. As I get older I have less patience for self destructive people like Lucy. I believe after reading Patchetts book that Lucy was a deeply disturbed individual who needed serious help-not people to placate her. This is not to say I don’t feel sorry for her, because I do. But the account of her in this book makes her very hard to like.

I was moved by Ann Patchett’s telling of Lucy’s story because it speaks so passionately and clearly about the essential human condition. Each of us has something in our lives we deal with in order to learn the true life lesson, which is to love ourselves as divine beings so we can love others and see divinity in them. For Lucy, her “thing” was external, on display every waking moment. It’s heartbreaking that the gifts she was given to help her through–that did in fact allow her to transcend the pain and shame and incompleteness to lead this incredibly alive life that was inspirational for many–were not enough in the end to sustain her. Or, actually that she couldn’t keep in touch with those gifts to see her through. She abandoned her writing, one of her gifts, even though she knew it was her salvation. Many artists are too sensitive, too intelligent, too not-of-this-world to always survive in this world–that is the heartbreak of their genius. It doesn’t strike me as self-absorption but self-negation, the feeling you’re not worth it, but since you also sense you have come “trailing clouds of glory” as Wordsworth wrote, you try to make sense of why you don’t feel loved. I think most of us have something that we hold out there, thinking “When I get that parent’s love, or that car, or that job, or that child, or whatever, I’ll know I’m ok.” But we don’t voice it but just keep scrabbling after ‘it” and wearing a mask that we’re ok already. Lucy didn’t have that luxury. She showed great courage and faith in her friends to be able to ask that question repeatedly since she was feeling it. I know I stop myself and cut myself off from friends because I don’t want to talk about what’s really going on with me because I know they’ve heard it before.
But I digress. A few years ago this is how I summed up my life: “She was never more beautiful than when men were leaving her.” So I’ve been told I am beautiful more often than my fair share, but always as compensation for men not wanting to just be with me. My father sexually abused me and my mother neglected and sacrificed me, so my ugliness and my shame at that were hidden and more insidious for me to forgive and form that crucial relationship with myself first. And I’m only now beginning to glimpse what loving myself first means and getting a clue as to how to do it. And I have been luckier than Lucy because I have not had the distractions of fame and writing genius or the temptations of necessary painkillers to work through, and even then I’ve put it off until I’ve absolutely had to choose love myself or die, which I just can’t do to my two grown sons–miracles she also didn’t have.
It seemed to me as I was reading that Lucy’s self-love got seared along with the chemo at age 10 so Lucy’s friends, especially Ann, treated her like a loving parent of a 10-year old. They helped out with shelter and money and other basic needs, and they gave her unconditional love and patiently, sincerely asnwered her unending questions in an affirmative way. But they were also clear in their expectations of her behavior and didn’t let her off the hook. And it worked most of Lucy’s life and she went on to touch people’s lives and leave a legacy of inspiration for many. It’s nobody’s fault her body and soul just gave out too soon for those who loved her.
I am grateful today that Lucy Grealy and Ann Patchett graced our lives by sharing their life lessons with us in their writing. And I hope Ann Patchett continues to grace my life with her lyrical, magical words so I can continue to be transformed by them in my own way.

I picked up Truth & Beauty because Ann Patchett is, without par, my favorite fiction author. I have read all of her four novels and have been moved by each. Though each is quite unique and seemingly different from the others, I find a common thread through them all – Love – coming as a surprise in the most unlikely places and between the most disparate individuals; Love as a saving grace; Love that does not fit our traditional, romantic ideas of love but that is tranformative, transcendent, and amazing. That theme is certainly carried through in Truth & Beauty.
Ann’s consistancy in her love and support for Lucy throughout her tragically difficult life is, to me, nothing short of heroic. I too have recently lost a brother to a lifetime of alcoholism and addiction. And the lesson in that struggle and in Truth & Beauty is that, no matter how hard we try, how deeply we desire it, our love cannot fix, heal or control those damaged people in our lives who are set on a path to their own distruction. There are those among us who, though brilliant, gifted, beautiful shining stars, cannot be saved from their self-destructive impulses. Those impulses can lead them, as they did with Lucy, to do hurtful things and behave in ways that damage those around them. Our challenge, if we can keep our hearts open, is to learn to love them without being consumed and destroyed by them. It is no easy task. But although our love cannot ultimately save them, it does save us, and, I hope, it eases their passage through this life that is just too much for them.
I see in Truth & Beauty Ann Patchett’s attempt to work through the grief of the loss of her dearest friend, as well as her attempt to clarify for herself the personal meaning of this lifelong dance with Lucy and to find and relate the truth and the beauty of it. She has done a remarkable, beautiful, courageous job.

So anyone critical of Lucy Grealy is “bereft of love”? “Ssuan” sounds like your typical bleeding-heart, dipsy-doodle social worker. Either that, or she was drunk when she wrote that. Really, the attempts here to canonize Grealy and make her atrocious behavior seem justified, are revolting. Even Grealy’s sister is critical of her. Suellen Grealy wrote a piece for The Guardian Review entitled “Hi-jacked By Grief”, in which she voices her displeasure at the way Ann Patchett has cashed in on her friendship with Grealy. The article states that although the parts describing their father in “Autobiography of a Face” were “unbearably true” a lot of the book was “careless”. Suellen said that Lucy selected her vantage point when describing her family, and that “readers would accept it as the only true vantage point”. As as result Suellens’s mother’s parenting skills (or lack of them) are the focus of questions in reading guides and book clubs. Suellen goes on to say that Patchett was a good friend to Lucy, “who could be infuriatingly disorganized and irresponsible”, and that she was able, it seemed, to accept Lucy’s constant need of approbation and affection, even when Lucy herself ignored, and even scorned, those needs in others”. Indeed, even the loyal Ann gets short shrift from Grealy; “when a review copy of Ann’s book, Taft, arrived by courier at my house in London, Lucy, staying with me, didn’t bother to open it. I wasn’t surprised by the way she tossed it dismissively on to chair, for she rarely showed interest, at least to me, in other people’s achievements. I felt sorry for Ann, then, because I knew how much she had done for my sister”. There is more to the article but the upshot is that the wonderful friend Ann Patchett has made her dear, dear friend Lucy into a source of money and fame. She told Suellen that she, Patchett, was working, writing, and living in “the Lucy factory”. She mentioned film rights. The more I learn about both Lucy Grealy and Ann Patchett, the more dislikeable they appear. These two truly deserved each other. And I am not the only one who considers this bizarre “friendship” between “two women who truly love each other” nauseating. I came across a review of Joyce Carol Oates’s latest book, a collection of book reviews and observations. The writer, Brandon M. Stickney, comments on the section about Truth and Beauty: “Oates transports us to the memoir “Truth and Beauty” by Ann Patchett, in which the author describes her near lesbian, wholly infantile and repulsive relationship to tortured memoirist Lucy Grealy. What would seem drunken passion between two college age roomies—“In a second she was in my arms, leaping into me, her arms locked around my neck, her legs wrapped around my waist”—becomes horrifying considering Grealy’s disfiguring face cancer that makes her resemble a dying boy in a medieval Bosch”. I couldn’t have said it better myself!

I find this book to be a good picture of a complicated relationship. Lucy is certainly portrayed as a complex personality, deeply flawed in a human and touching way – capable of being fascinating, energetic, emotionally draining, exasperating, and demanding all at once. Ann seems almost too bland and too accommodating to have much depth…maybe that’s part of the author’s attempt to widen the dramatic contrast between the two personalities and focus tighter on their differences, which she certainly does.
I also found that the book revealed a typical enabler/addict pattern in the friendship (Ann being the typical enabler and Lucy the addict in various ways). Whether this is something to get angry about is beside the point, in my opinion. Truth & Beauty seems to be an honest portrait of at least one perspecitve on these people’s very human experience and shows how our own choices, as well as forces outside our control, can shape our lives and destinies.
I don’t understand why so many people here get caught up in arguing with each other about whose reaction to the book is “right.” That’s the point of a book, of a story, that each reader can have their own reaction. We each have our own “values.” I personally think any addict can be very hard to maintain a friendship with – that’s just one aspect of addiction’s destructive power – it destroys relationships, people, plans, dreams.
The magic of good literature, in my opinion, is that it can affect so many people differently and deeply. Apparently, it has affected the readers here. I found it an absorbing read, well worth my time.

Firstly, I was greatful to find this site, but I haven’t had a chance to endure reading through the enormous amount of material that people have written, although I think it is wonderful that you all are taking so much interest in Miss. Grealy. I actually just finished reading Ann Patchett’s book today and went online to search for more information about it. I just have a few comments to say because I believe some people are just being unfair and they really DON’T understand what it is like to live daily having a facial difference. In my own life I have personally experienced this and I identified with so many of the things Ann spoke about regarding Lucy. In a way I have to admire her as she was willing to put herself out there and actually had the guts/drive to enter into situations where her facial difference would potentially be brought up. In my own life I am still struggling to do this and I believe Lucy had a great amount of strength in her character throughout most of her life, obiviously her friends gave her some of this strength. Some people just honestly will never understand how difficult it is to be out in society and know that everyone is staring at you and “wondering” what happened to you. Do you know how difficult it was for me to simply go up to the counter at the bookstore and buy Autobiography of a Face? Most people wouldn’t think twice about buying a book that discusses disfigurement, but I did because I was scared that they would stare at my face and the little self-confidence that I had would be shattered again. I am not saying that one should forgive Lucy for all of her, what did you guys call it??? “Infantile behavior”… However, any form of facial difference can have a profound effect on an individual. Everyone has bad moments when they need a great deal of support and sympathy and Lucy is extremely lucky she had Ann. Everyone acts childish at one point or another in adult life so I do not think we should criticize Lucy for it. Instead, I think all of you that are so interested in determing whether Lucy was a saint or not should go to the Children’s Craniofacial Association website and help the thousands of children like Lucy that live with facial disfigurement today. That is http://www.ccakids.org. If nothing else you can learn more and hopefully educate others about individuals with facial differences so that it is not so hard in the future for people like Lucy.

I just finished reading Ann Patchett’s “Truth and Beauty” and was very touched by the suffering of Lucy Grealey and the suffering caused by her. Having had personal experience of loving a person who was damaged and addicted, I felt much sorrow for Lucy and great empathy for Ann.
I enjoyed reading all the posts here and found value in all opinions, however I am puzzled by Cynthia’s obvious intolerance and judgement. First I will say that while Cynthia states early on that she also suffered much teasing and torment by her peers during her youth, she doesn’t appear to have taken anything away from that but anger and resentment. Anyone who judges others so harshly seems to have no depth of emotions. Nothing is black and white and a person’s faults and character defects do not prevent them from feeling and needing love. Each of us are born a blank slate, for the most part, and our personalities and traits, both good and bad are formed from our experiences and with the possible exception of true sociopaths, have much to love, even the worst of us. I also feel a little sorry for Cynthia since anyone who can make such sweeping judgements about someone else, especially when her knowledge of the person she is judging is based almost solely on the perceptions of another, must be very lonely herself.

Cynthia, yet again you appear to see things in extremes and your responses seem (yes, again I said seem) excessive and intolerant. I can’t quite understand the vehemence with which you express your opinion though again I believe it is driven by your own pain and experience. You are entitled to your opinion, and you certainly make plenty if sense, on many levels but should allow others their opinions without resorting to the “last gasp of the ignorant”, name calling and insults.

Though I had a more-sympathetic reading of the book than Cynthia, it can be difficult to be the one who dares voice a minority opinion.
Cynthia, I agree with others that some of your reactions are “intense”, for lack of a more descriptive word — but not more so than others who have taken the opportunity to post what appear to be segue ways into airing their own tales of tragedy. If the book inspired strong feelings, then you were brave to put those out there, no matter how unpopular your message or your delivery may be. I don’t agree with all your points, but your last post was right on target and made a good argument — whether you find Lucy sympathetic or not, it’s hard to argue that she couldn’t be infuriating. I think Patchett’s book corroborates that view.
Whoever said it above was right — the value is not in making sure all our opinions are the same; rather, it lies in how varied (and obviously how STRONG!) our responses to a book can be.

I agree with Skye. Truth and Beauty is about a complicated and loving relationship. Ann Patchett and Lucy must be pretty darn good writers for all of us to sit down and write ourselves. Truth? Beauty? It’s all in the eye of the beholder.

Cynthia must have read one self-help book dealing with addiction. She certainly learned all about “enabling”. She is absolutely correct in most of her facts. About addiction, weakness, selfishness, etc. She obviously has very strong feelings about the subject, Ann Patchett’s book not withstanding. However, she overdoes it a bit with all the “if you do not have total, unconditional love, compassion, and acceptance for someone who feels “pain”, even if the person in question is a self-absorbed, completely in denial drug addict, then you are just a terrible, terrible person indeed.” and “that’s true of all the Lucy-groupies who have congregated her. In their myopic view, Lucy Grealy is someone only to be admired and revered, someone whose suffering is justification for her life-long odious behavior, and anyone who dares to disagree with that proclamation is “bereft of love”, “lacks the ability to attempt to understand anothers grief and to offer compassion”, “judges others harshly”, why any person who doesn’t love little Lucy is just a big ol’ MEANIE!”. If Cynthia would READ most of the post’s instead of basking in her self-determined superiority and thinking about her next post she might notice that most people have also read that self-help book and further, are neither “bleeding-heart, dipsy doodles” or self-righteous Cynthias with all the answers. There is some middle ground here and most of the people that have posted here are standing on it. Cynthia just can’t see them from her lofty perch. My twelve-stepping friends also say that they will not risk their own sobriety by enabling or otherwise dealing with an addict/alcoholic who is unwilling to help themselves and become healthier, happier, more productive citizens but they also understand the addict/alcoholic better than anyone and feel compassion for their pain. Maybe especially because it’s self-inflicted.

I lost my best friend to soft-tissue cancer (form of sarcoma) like Ms.Patchett. Michel Foucault once said that we write to BE, not necessarily to prove something or some other reason. So, I think writing is one of these profound acts we do to engage in living and being. Ok I am not here to debate Foucault, but I think he is on to something. I see it in this blog phenonemnon so very clearly– all these faceless, soundless voices … of people compelled to say something (some more than others, of course). This is clear here, as well. It seems we all find, in some way, engaged in the problem which Patchett presents us: how do we live, how do we love?
The answer I find is this continual exercise of transcending ourselves. Our own culure’s aversion to suffering clearly demonstrates some sort of discomfort with being grounded in our bodies– thus perhaps limited in our ability to ‘get’ outside ourselves and do/think/act/love– LIVE.
I have nothing to say about these women except that they were (and are) human beings in the truest sense, in that they engaged fearlessly (obviously in different ways) with life. Grealy had her own battles and we can pass judgement if we please, but is this really helping us to connect with anything? Does judgement get us anywhere?
For some(ahem) I am one more sentimental poop. Thanks, I will remember that when I see your child suffer when I know I can help (say, with my kidney or bone marrow). Or I vote to send her to war. Because, afterall, I can’t save every one. Every ONE (1) should fend for themselves. We are indeed individuals with unique agency. (note the sarcasm please)
Everything changes when you suffer or see it. All I will say, in this admittedly long ramble, is judge not lest ye be judged. Love thy neighbor as thyself. And when someone slaps you, turn the other cheek. This is life and living. As is the struggle to live this message, which to some degree, we are all engaged in.
Where does my own dear friend fit in? Now I wonder if I should ever write a memoir to honor her…seeing as how indeed many might totally miss the point and (even ignoring the wishes of her own family, as here I am even doing so–for which i apologize) go off debating someone LIFE– their LIFE, a whole entire LIFE– as if they themselves were God… With my friend, I perhaps will continue to confine my honor of her to the way in which I live my life. Indeed, she lives on in this way.
Let us live and let live.
Indeed, I see so much hope in how much love and acceptance I DO see on this site and book. To others in whom I can’t quite see it, I only hope you will learn to love everyone as yourself and I thank you for expressing your voices. For at the very least, they give others’ context and alternatives.

I read Truth and Beauty a few weeks ago and haven’t been able to stop thinking of it since then. I had not ready Lucy’s book, so I ordered it and just finished reading it yesterday.
I’ve read most of the comments on this blog, and what I find interesting is that I agree with most of them, even those that differ. What touched me about the story and about Lucy is that she did not seem to be just any one of these things: she was not simply self-absorbed, heroic, childish, brave… she was all these things. Why do we so want to categorize her?
The story Ann told painted a picture of a troubled, complex woman who wanted more than anything to be loved. Even while all her friends loved her, Lucy did not believe she was loved in the way she wanted to be. She craved a kind of intimacy that would take her outside herself and make her see herself as someone worthy and beautiful. She used her surgeries as a vehicle to a place of self-acceptance, but she never really got there.
What struck me the most about this story was how accurate Ann Patchett’s portrayal of Lucy seemed to be. After I read Ann’s book, I had a strong impression of Lucy, and this impression stayed after I read Lucy’s book. Ann seemed to really know and love this woman, and the love she had was complicated and at times anguished. But isn’t that what a true friendship really is? Don’t be at times get very frustrated with our friends, even dislike them and find ourselves searching for what brought us to them in the first place?
Lucy and Ann had a relationship that I don’t really understand, but I don’t need to. I haven’t experienced a friendship that asks so much of me and, at times, gives so little. I haven’t been through the extraordinary trauma Lucy went through her entire life, and yet sometimes I feel as unlovable as she did. Sometimes I feel that way and my face is fine; I am not sick. I have not been tormented most of my life.
But despite that, I can relate to the emotional frailty of Lucy and the protective love Ann felt for her. I don’t really need to understand their love. I’m just glad I got such a powerful glimpse into it.

I just finished T&B and had to google “Lucy Grealy” which led me to this site. I enjoy Patchett’s work, but until T&B had never heard of Lucy G. I loved the book, loved Lucy, loved Ann. I’m blown away by the judgmental comments of most of the bloggers. Was Lucy good or bad? Were Lucy and Ann co-dependent? Did they have some lesbian-esque relationship? Get over it, People! One of the most remarkable attributes of T&B is the truthfulness w/ which Patchett tells the story of the amazing Lucy. She tells it through her own lense — not attempting to pretty up the story of Lucy, the way so many memoirists might. It’s a remarkable work about two remarkable women.

I just finished “Truth and Beauty.” About a quarter of the way through, I started thinking this was a complicated relationship with some wonderful aspects — and some pretty sick aspects. By the end of the book, I felt the sick aspects predominated.
I googled Lucy Grealy, knowing nothing about her, and was surprised at how attractive she was. After reading the book, I was expecting the female equivalent of the Elephant Man. This was not a hideous woman, not by a long chalk. Her endless obsessions with improving her face in order to find happiness were ultimately founded on something other than reality.
She certainly was fascinating, at least in Anne Pratchett’s book, but I didn’t like her. She seemed to be a bottomless pit of need. That’s one of the saddest things that pain (emotional or physical) can do to a person — it can make them completely self-centered and ultimately lonely. Or, as others here have pointed out, it can strengthen them. It’s all in what we do with it. Lucy identified herself by her pain; she *was* her disfigurement. And that’s a shame, because she could’ve been so much more.
As for Anne … I have thoroughly enjoyed her fiction and was blown away by “Bel Canto.” In this book, she shows herself to be nearly as complex and puzzling as Lucy herself. In the end, I didn’t see this as a wonderful story of a beautiful, loving friendship at all but as something else, something obsessive and needy on both sides, with points of light and grace amidst the considerable murk. A fascinating, compulsively readable, suffocating book that I’m ultimately happy to put away.

After finishing Truth and Beauty I found myself searching for more information regarding Grealy and Patchett, thus stumbling across this ongoing debate. As with everything in this life, there are at least two sides to most stories. It is not difficult to acquire a sour taste for Grealy after reading Truth and Beauty. People, myself included, tend to have a great deal of disgust for self-centered individuals and rightfully so. I do believe that Grealy’s self-doubt and self-hatred wore the mask of narcissism. Patchett has received criticism for her actions and reactions to Grealy’s behavior, and blame has been carelessly thrown about in an effort to attain what exactly? I do not believe that Patchett wrote this book for fame or money or nominating herself for canonizaton. I believe she wrote this book because so much of her life had been tied up in trying to keep Lucy up and on her feet, literally and metaphorically. It is a full-time position when you try to maintain another person’s mental health, and perhaps some would criticize the gesture in and of itself. That is infact the nature of many relationships, healthy or not. For whatever reason, or lack of reason, some people need constant reassurance of worth and love and purpose. Lucy Grealy was desperate for justification, and Ann Patchett simply could not deny her of this need. That is friendship; seeing the disturbing pieces of a human and choosing to see past them when the whole world is ready to stop and point fingers and assess blame. Heroin addiction is a sad and dark love affair. It is a constant search for being in the light and for feeling momentarily hopeful. The seducing power of a relationship with heroin is relentless and consuming. Cynthia has repeatedly referred to Grealy as pathetic. Several others have posted stories of those they know recovering from cancer and other painstaking ordeals and continuing to live life without succumbing to drugs or alcohol. Addiction is human in every form. No matter how much we have we will still want more. Grealy just wanted more. She liked what it felt like to be in the light of self-assuring attention and she enjoyed it openly and shamelessly. Heroin gave her that light when she exhausted all of her other resources, including Patchett. Life will always be about the give and take. It is easy to see Grealy as the one doing all of the taking in this relationship, but not all acts of giving present themselves for viewing. They are rather like shells on the ocean floor waiting silently for the ocean to toss them haphazardly into the light on the shore. It is these acts that reflect truth and beauty. It is these acts that are carried silently, deep in flesh. Ann carried, and continues to carry, Lucy simply because it was harder to put her down.

Hmm, a site almost completely composed of comments by Women–exc. for Lucy’s bro & that kind man, “Richard.” I’m always getting e-mails from women about how wonderful women are & how “I cdn’t hv survived w/o my female friends,” & I’m told, “Send this on to all the wonderful women in your life.” Well, some of the women who have posted to this site exemplify the reasons I DON’T send these panegyrics along: labelling, judgmentalism, holier-than-thou-ism.
E.g., “I have had sorrow in my life & I handled it much better than Lucy did, blah blah.” Excuse me, but YOU are not the UNIVERSE. Some people handle things well, some badly.
To me, the ugliest word in the English language is “should.” “Lucy should have done & been this, Ann should have done & been that.” They were the way they were, they reacted the way they did.
Plus, What they both were/are beyond question is much better writers than ANY of you are or I am! So lay off all this judgmentalism & take their stories into yourself & see what they tell you about human nature & female nature. (That’s not a “should,” just a suggestion.)
I would very much like to know if there is any true story out there about a similar friendship betw MEN & how it compares. Any suggestions?

Can someone please tell me how Lucy died?

Amazing. I have not been back to this site for 2 months-still going strong. I appreciate Patricia’s comment, but I’m 65 and I think a general rule of life is that most people cut each other more slack as we get older. Cynthia makes this place interesting, even if I feel, and most of the others feel, that she is too tough. But, Lucy’s comments about her mother kind of surprised me, I have to admit. I know a woman-mid 40’s, with a husband and two kids. Very nice. But she had an argument with her mother-70’s- at Christmas, and they are now not talking. And she is the only child. It’s hard to cut someone slack for being tough publicly on a parent, but who hasn’t made horrific mistakes? I don’t think men typically want relationships with men as intense as Lucy and Ann had. Somehow when Ann went to visit Lucy in Scotland it felt right, but for a man to do it would seem excessive to me, unless it was a brother, cousin, maybe. I don’t know. The question made me think. When I was 28 a friend of mine went to a Boston Hospital for cancer and other termianl illnesses – the Shattuck(?)- at least that is what I thought the hospital was for at the time. I visited him once a week- 45 minutes at a time for a year or so. A trip to Europe would have been unthinkable. When I put it in that perspective, it makes me think that this was a real friendship. Maybe it could be labeled codependency, but Lucy was glad to see her when she needed a friend.
richard

Just finished Truth and Beauty. Awaiting the arrival of Lucy’s book from Amazon. I found an article Lucy’s sister wrote criticing Ann for writing the details of her sister’s life. It was sad but shouldn’t surprise me- a life like Lucy’s probably leaves those left behind with every emotion there is to feel. Too bad her sister can’t appreciate the fullness and the flaws of Lucy’s life. She goes on to refer to Ann as a not too gifted writer. I certainly disagree with that.
The thing is, my life is nothing like Lucy’s and outrwardly couldn’t look more unlike hers- buy I can identify with the feelings. The difference is that I don’t let those feelings drown me- but I grew up with a ‘normal’ life and Lucy didn’t. God give her some peace, where ever she is now.

Well well well!
What a hoot to stumble upon this website and find that there are people before me who have done the exact same thing: Read ‘Truth & Beauty’ at a voracious pace, then jumped on the computer to find out more about Lucy Grealy (on Google, specifically)! 🙂 I must admit, as someone else did earlier, that I have only read bits and pieces of this discussion, but enough to get a very broad view of what other readers have reacted to in the book. To be quite honest, I don’t know what to say, or how to react to everything that has been said. Though books are always a great point of discussion, I don’t really understand the need to get so worked up! If anything, Ann Patchett should be pleased that her novel has sparked such lively dialogue. And in the end, it will only be her who knows the true nature of this relationship.
Regardless of anyone’s perceptions of Ann or Lucy, ‘Truth and Beauty’ was really a great story of unconditional love. Or at least I found it to be so. To Patchett’s credit (and she did admit that she came close to walking out of Lucy’s life), it takes a great deal of strength and sacrifice to be a completely unwavering friend. There are a precious few people in this world who have that capacity to love someone, be it a friend or lover, in a no-holds-barred sort of way. (Being someone who is in a relationship with a man who Loves like this, it is definitely something to be marveled at. I still wonder how he can look at me when I’m upset and tell me he loves me!) As I’m sure many of us are aware, loving someone is not always the easiest thing in the world. It’s difficult to love someone who has hurt your feelings, or angered you, or done something you don’t agree with. It takes an impressive human being to say “I love you” back, no matter what the circumstances may be, no matter how painful it may be to say it.
My wish for Ann Patchett is that, in this second part of her life — “The Part Without Lucy” — is that she find a friend who will find it in their hearts to be *her* pillar of strength, through both good and bad.
In fact, I wish that for all of you here.

I think that everyone is forgetting that “Autobiography of a Face” was not writen on pure fact. It even states at the end that when she went to that book signing with Ann, Lucy made the coment that it was fiction. She did not remember everything and if she were to have written the book as a memior then it would be to painful for the reader. This book is based on events in her life the the actual event. Think of it as a Lifetime Original Movie.

I just finished reading Ann Pathcett’s Truth and Beauty and jsut like most of the reviewers on this site, logged on to the internet to find out more about Lucy and Ann. I have mixed feelings about this book. I am glad I found this website to exchange opinions about it.
My reaction to Truth and Beauty does not seem similar to the reactions of many of you. When I had already read half way through the book, I had already developed skeptical feelings towards Ann. I always questioned her motive for writing all this. I think all throughout the book Ann highlighted Lucy’s helplessness and portrayed her own self as a helpful and supportive friend. I don’t call this a friendship. If certain favors are genuinly done, then they are better not said or mentioned by the doers. If Ann was a true friend, then I do not think she would have revealed all the privacy about Lucy’s life. She would have respected Lucy.
After finishing the book, I came to believe that Lucy’s success story was not a source of happiness for Ann. I think there was always some kind of jealousy. Ann did not have the socially outgoing personality as Lucy had. Ann was not only academically, but also socially jealous of Lucy’s skills and talents. This book was an opportunity for Ann to open up all the back stage details of Lucy’s past and stabilize her own position in the foreground of Lucy’s success story. I do not like Ann. And I am glad I do not have friends like her.
I think this book presents the co-dependent relationship of two women. I have compassion and empathy towards Lucy. I don’t see her as manipulative. If other people have been manipulated by Lucy, then that is because they wanted to act that way, they were never forced to do anything. And Lucy was socially capable of acting as a social magnet. Lucy was an extraordinary character that everyone wanted to keep in their lives in one way or an other.
Ann’s favors and help towards Lucy cannot be ignored. While I appreciate her support towards Lucy, I also think that there was some sort of self-serving motive involved in her actions. It may be argued that Lucy’s neediness made Ann feel better about herself. Perhaps her Catholic background was also influential in motivating her towards helping other people in need.

I see nothing wrong with Ann Patchett’s observations and testiments about Lucy Grealy in her essays and in her story “Truth and Beauty.” Part of an author’s job is to write ‘ the truth,’ no matter how ugly it may be. Ann Patchett first handedly experinced Lucy Grealy, therefore has the validity & right to write about what she saw and experienced (as long as it is an accurate account). People may argue that Ann Patchett’s writings were damaging to Lucy Grealy’s repuation or that she betrayed her trust; however Ann Patchett spoke the truth & exposed certain perspectives to her readers; which is a main objective for a writer.

Just finished T&B, but haven’t read Lucy’s book yet — although now I have to. I was intrigued by Ann’s guilt over pulling away from Lucy toward the end of her life…it’s a terrible burden to feel responsibility for another adult’s choices, despite recognizing that one is powerless to change their tragic flaws. The story of Lucy’s life could be juxtaposed to a novel by Emile Zola . . . was her endless need for attention an unavoidable consequence of her environment and not solely related to the disfiguring cancer? Perhaps nothing could have changed her slide into drug addiction — not less friends, not more friends, not even a quartet of slavishly devoted lovers.
Ann Patchett’s book is exquisitely written and deeply heartfelt, whether or not you agree with how she conducted herself as a friend. And, obviously, it has struck a nerve, good or bad, with many of us.

I just read Patchett’s book and read most of the postings at this site. I wish to point out a couple of things that seemed to have missed by others. First, in the beginning of their relationship, Lucy was a great deal of fun. Remember their dancing every night. As a writer I also know the value of having someone you can trust to bounce ideas around and to share drafts.
Ann was also fascinated by Lucy because she was so different and exotic. Yes, I saw the co-dependency pattern that began to emerge and got worse in the final years of the relationship, as well as Lucy’s self-obsession and narcissism. But Lucy wasn’t just having operations to make herself attractive. Remember how Patchett talks about Lucy’s lack of teeth, problems with eating, etc. The woman probably never had a well-balanced meal in 30 years, and clearly imbibed alcohol as fuel. As Lucy’s life deteriorated, it’s clear that Patchett WAS having problems dealing with it, and was not engaging in unconditional co-dependency. She never could have created the books she did, maintained the relationships she had, if she’d let Lucy control her entire life. In fact, Lucy may have been a muse, in a bizarre sort of way.

I also looked for information about Lucy Grealy after reading first Truth and Beauty, and then AOAF. First, Veronica comment was nothing but cruel, and seems completely uneducated. I am astonished she chose to put herself on the same level of Lucy’s Jr. High tormenters and then publish it.
I have read comments on Ann and Lucy, berating and lauding them both. I came away with two thoughts after reading T & B. First, others have called Ann an enabler, which may be true, but when one is completely vested in a friendship, it has no conditons. You are what that friend needs at different times of their life because you love them. Rarely do people stop themselves to analyze thier motives.
Second, Ann Patchett is a writer. Writers most often work through emotions by WRITING. I can imagine the process of writing T & B was very carthartic for her, and probably did allow her to excorcise certain demons. I think it unfair to say she wrote this book strictly for money. For others to read the story of her friendship, they would have to buy the book. Friends, and friendships, are not perfect in the best of circumstances. I think she did a beautiful job with this book.

I just finished reading Bel Canto. I truly feel like Ann Patchett wrote a story she did not know how to end so she shot all the characters. What a disappointment. She did not even identify the shooter. I will not read another one of her books. She cheats the reader.

Peace.

In all likelihood, Grealy probably would have had real difficulties even with a normal face. She was mentally ill; her cancer and disfigurement probably exacerbated her mental condition, but did not cause it. I don’t know what her exact diagnosis would have been, but judging from her behavior she had violent mood swings, depression, narcissicm, an inability to reason, and engaged in compulsive promiscuity. Was she bi-polar? Schizophrenic? Did she have a personality disorder, or several personality disorders? No one will know. But this IS for certain: she was a seriously mentally-ill woman, and she would NOT help herself. It was her destiny to end up as she did; a suicide.

Having just finished Truth and Beauty I too decided to do some research.
Lucy was perhaps gifted, witty, self absorbed and frustrating. Internally chaotic and fragile.
When I read that she had found heroin I knew she would struggle to ‘lose’ it again, for people like Lucy heroin can be most intergrating, and can make them feel more “whole” than they been able to previously.
The irony of Truth and Beauty is that is is neither, rather a story focussing on an individuals subjective experience. it can be no more or less.
It was however a great reading experience.

Read this stunning article about Lucy…
‘Remembering Lucy Grealy’ By Flaminia Ocampo
http://www.verbsap.com/2005dec/ocampo.html

I don’t think it is that strange that the drunk students in Scotland or the New School MFAs disliked Lucy and the New York literati loved and appreciated her (which they actually did). It makes sense that there were more kindred spirits amongst her poet/artist friends than amongst her 1st year MFAs or late-night college inebriates — don’t you think?

Suzanne dear, I never said I “hated” the book. I found it quite interesting, as well as disturbing and infuriating. As for my opinion of Ann Patchett’s co-dependency being a “joke”…not hardly. Here is one definition of co-dependence: “a preoccupation and extreme dependence (emotionally, socially, and sometimes physically) on a person or object. Eventually this dependence on another person becomes a pathological condition that affects the co-dependent in all other relationships”. Ann Patchett’s fixation on Lucy Grealy began in college, where Patchett views Grealy as a “celebrity” and is not offended when Grealy rudely rebuffs her shy attempts to initiate a conversation with her. When Patchett is accepted into the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, Grealy has the gall to write Patchett and ask her to find a place for her to live. They end up renting a place together; when Patchett arrives Grealy (who Patchett doesn’t even really know at all) leaps onto her like a maniac, wrapping her legs around Patchett and “crying into my hair”. Any reasonable person would have thought: “this woman is insane. Let me outta here!” But not Patchett; she is “thrilled” to be “chosen” by Lucy. Things progress from there, co-dependency wise. Patchett is Grealy’s slave, doing all the cooking and cleaning. When Patchett gets a boyfriend Grealy demands to know, who do you love best, me or him? After lamely trying to say that you can love different people in different ways Patchett concedes that she loves Lucy best. Patchett asks Grealy for permisssion, PERMISSION, to have relationships with other people. As the years pass, Patchett feeds Grealy, bathes her, nurses her, bullies doctors into giving her more pain medication than she needs, pays her bills, tells her she can live with her as long as she wants, bill-free and worry-free. She finally develops a lasting relationship with a man, in no small part because Grealy has given her approval, and tries half-heartedly to distance herself a bit from the limpet-like Grealy. Of course inevitably Grealy dies of a drug overdose; Patchett had previously threatened to “leave” her over the drug use, but later realizes she could NEVER “give up” Lucy. After Grealy’s death Patchett laments about the second half of her life “the half that would be lived without Lucy”. Ann Patchett was ADDICTED to Lucy Grealy, a woman who used her, frequently treated her like crap, and appeared to harbor half-concealed contempt for her devoted, loyal, unceasingly giving friend. Ann Patchett is co-dependence personified. As for Lucy Grealy, there are been many, many disfigured human beings who have gone on to happy, productive lives and good relationships and good marriages. It all comes down to choices. And Lucy Grealy’s choices were sex, druga and surgery. She thought that one or all of those things would somehow transform her life and make her happy and beautiful. She was obviously deeply mentally ill. Maybe if she had gotton the proper treatment for that things would have been different for her.

Cynthia, it all depends on how you look at it. You can choose to look at Ann Patchett as self-serving and addicted or you can choose to see her as one who was capable of loving another person selflessly and unconditionally. I choose the latter.

Ah, but Lucy Grealy DID harm others. She harmed Ann Patchett repeatedly, by being a selfish, inconsiderate, slovenly roommate, by leeching off her financially. When Patchett moves in with a boyfriend, Grealy for some reason is given a key to the place. She takes at least one man to Patchett and the boyfriend’s home and has sex with the man in THEIR bed. And then tells Patchett about it. It would seem to me that that was a deliberate attempt on Grealy’s part to hurt the feelings of her dear “pet”. What else could it be? Grealy caused a lot of pain for her family by her behavior, in particular her awful comments about her mother. I’m sure Grealy’s creditors have no liking for her, since she defaulted on loans and refused to pay her taxes. And then there is the matter of Grealy driving while drunk or stoned. On one occasion she plowed into a tree; she could have just as easily plowed into another car or a person, and seriously injured or even killed someone. Lucy Grealy certainly harmed herself, but she was also no slouch when came to harming others. And that is one of the reasons why a lot of people disliked. her.

I did not cry, instead, I have allowed this story to change my life. The Lucy and Ann in me fight for balance.
I loved the dreams Ann had after Lucy died, and felt that Lucy was simply letting her know she was fine, that in death, the ultimate journey, she had discovered how to love herself.

It seems to me having read the comments posted that most of you are close minded regarding Cynthia. I do not agree with her in many things she says, but I think most of you miss the point that Lucy would have! Lucy did not want your sympathy or pity; she knew knew she was flawed and faced it unflinchingly. Part of the reason she was so profoundly depressed was that she felt she had no right to be saddened by her own plight in light of other world attrocities and suffering.
Also those of you who call Cynthia judgmental then retaliate with passive aggressive mud slinging of your own, thinly disguised as suggestions or “feeling sorry for her,” admit it for what is: name calling. Cynthia engages in it too, but is at least honest about it. I’d rather hear her call others the relatively harmless epithet “dipsy doodles” than listen to immature posters taking potshots at her psyche because she has a divergent opinion.
I obviously cannot speak with certainty on the opinions of someone I’ll never know. Instead I only base it on what Lucy has said herself and what Ann Patchett confirms. Lucy wanted to be loved for the sake of her talents; which truthfully makes her more unique than her diagnoses physical or mental. Her suffering certainly enhanced her writing, and ultimately sabotaged it as well. She shows awareness of her shortcomings even when lacking the insight to bring about the necessary changes. There is an enormous sense of responsibility in her writing. She even blames herself for the perceived failing of needing to be loved. Cynthia thinks she’s pathetic? I bet Lucy did too. (I am not calling her pathetic myself; personally I’d use the word “tragic”.) But those who hold up her immense misfortunes as an excuse for the poor choices she often made do her an injustice as she held herself more accountable. She wanted our attention and literary respect, not woeful lamentation and pity.

I don’t see how this book “can help save another’s life”, unless it is used as a cautionary tale on how NOT to deal with someone who is a drug addict in total denial. Providing a drug addict with shelter and paying her bills is not going to help. Giving her a “mountain of gifts” and buying her massages and manicures and taking her to the movies and fixing her favorite foods is not going to help. Nursing and coddling her after her unnecessary surgeries is not going to help. If Lucy Grealy’s “friends” had ALL said to her “if you don’t get off drugs and stay off them, you will never see or hear from me again and I will have nothing to do with you” that MIGHT have been the incentive that would have forced her to do something to help herself. A psychiatrist of hers did just that. If her friends had had the backbone to do that it might have helped to save her life. Might have. Although I tend to think Grealy was a hopeless case; she probably would have ended up dying young no matter what. Well, we’ll never really know what would have happened had her friends rejected her in an attempt to force her to get her act together. But it would have been worth a shot.
As for YOU, dear Jessica, I have this to say. This is a blog, and I am expressing my opinion, my very STRONG opinion, on a book about a very sick relationship between two emotionally-disturbed women. If strong opinions are too much for you to take, I suggest you take YOUR neurosis to a reputable mental health profesional.

Here is another shorter interview with Lucy.
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1285/is_n2_v26/ai_18082720

I find this discussion so interesting because (apart from a few intelligent postings) it seems not to recognize the difference between life and art. But surely Autobiography of a Face is all about this fundamental distinction. The celebrated scene in which the young Lucy goes out for Halloween plays on the difference between the two. The many women she encounters undergoing cosmetic surgery are aware of it. Ann Patchett comments on it in her Afterword to the revised edition. Why is this so hard to grasp? Any autobiography or memoir makes a selection from the details that an already imperfect memory has to offer. It is, as Patchett says, like pulling the fragments of gold out of a torrential river. Most of us don’t have the patience.
These disputes about whether Lucy’s relationship with Ann was “codependent” are strikingly silly. Why not ask whether Miss Havisham was mean to Estella, or whether Popeye treated Olive Oyl with appropriate courtesy? I don’t mean to say that either AOAF or T&B is purely fictional, but both are admittedly perspectives on the truth. Most of the posts on this site seem to assume that we are in a court of law.
Learn how to read, for heaven’s sake.

Threatened by my strong opinions, huh Andy? Well, I don’t really care, that’s your problem. And let me remind you where you are, dear: this is a blog, a forum for discussion. As for “hysterical nonsense”…well my arguments are not hysterical OR nonsense. They DO offend a lot of people though, especially people who view the Grealy/Patchett relationship as unconditional love, a wonderful friendship, a beautiful, positive, enchanting story. Are you one of the loony Lucy-groupies?
You “don’t care whether either book was factual or fictional”. That’s pretty bizarre. Both books were memoirs; both were supposed to be “factual”, or as much as a story told from one perspective can be. Suellen Grealy claims that her sister’s book presents a skewed portrayal of her family, although she does describe her father well enough. Patchett’s book is completely unobjective; she is too blinded by ardor to put Grealy in the proper perspective. I’d like to see someone do a book that gives the reader an honest portrayal of the wreck that was Lucy Grealy. Maybe her sister will do something like that at some point in time.
If you don’t care about truthfulness in memoirs I suggest you read “A Million Little Pieces” by James Frey. You’d probably enjoy it.

I’m flattered at your interest in me, Eloise, but my life is private.
You don’t speak for the masses, sweetheart. Your declaration that I am the person on this blog that “we all love to hate” and your demand that I “tell us your story” is presumtuous, indeed. I don’t think anybody much cares about my life story. And whether of not I’m the person “we all love to hate”, I don’t give a damn what you or anyone else here thinks of me and I certainly don’t have to explain anything to you or any of the other goofy Lucy-groupies.
I don’t have to prove Lucy Grealy was a human train wreck. Ann Patchett’s book did that.
What it comes down to is this. Patchett and Grealy’s relationship was sick and dysfunctional to an extreme. The facts of the matter prove that. But there are people who don’t see it that way; they see a relationship where one person is used and abused by another person and loves it as true friendship and unconditional love. And that my dear, is a total crock.
I’ll say it again; if my views offend you, that’s your problem. Deal with it.

I have read both of these memoirs several times, I suppose because being someone with a ‘borderline’ personality, I really relate. I think that, indeed, Lucy had a borderline personality, and that Anne somehow must have taken great pleasure in playing the enabling/all-embracing role that she did. I do not judge them, but at the same time, I don’t think their relationship was altogeather wholesome. However, how many of us can claim to have perfect relationships with all the people in our lives? If we were to all write memoirs about our most significant relationships and be unflichingly honest, I think there would be a lot of oddness or even uglieness to expose. Being human is hard, and if you have been abused, disfigured or are mentally ill, it gets even harder. The ways in which we sustain ourselves inspite of our shortcommings is often through acts of compensation, extraordinary love, and sometimes strange soulful relationships that look nothing like what is ‘normal’.
I greatly appreciate people who write about and expose their psycological/relational histories, it is important for all of us to see what is really going on inside of one another, weather it is ugly, beautiful or just human.

I don’t think Ann had any right to disclose personal information about her “best friend” Talking about how she left half eaten bowls of mashed up spaghetti around, her abortion, her many lovers, her selfishness. A real “best friend” excepts these things and doesn’t write a tell all about them. If she was such a nag why did she put up with her. I don’t think Lucy was begging for her friendship, it sound like she had many other friends This book pretty such said this.
Look at me, wasn’t I a great friend to this insufferable woman.

In response to Stephanie, the book reviewer, I think Lucy’s family did the best they could in doing what they thought was best for her. Lucy was not the only member of that family with mental issues. They obviously had a lot on their plates. Also, dealing with an over-the-top, codependent personality is unbearably trying. At some point, you have to stop getting sucked in, stop trying to right every wrong and let the person survive on their own if they can. I feel for Lucy’s family. They aren’t authors, they don’t have the same capability as Ann to put their thoughts and feelings onto an open market for all to read and judge. The point has been made that both Lucy and Ann are offering perspectives–not necessarily true accounts of life. I don’t think that Lucy’s family deserves harsh criticism, as we have no idea what they are like, what they went through or how things really were for them–we’ve only read second hand accounts.

Just stumbled in here, as did many of you, and I have really enjoyed all the comments you posted these last few years. I just picked up the T&B book yesterday at a yard sale, read it today and became fascinated enough to want to learn more. I am glad to realize that I am not alone in the thoughts stirred up by this book. These web places are so good for that! Anyway, I am a therapist, a close woman friend, a sister of a dead heroin addict (whom I loved, even with the complications), someone who has experienced depression … the book just touched me in so many places, as most good books do. The only comment that I want to add to this longstanding discussion, because I don’t believe it has been mentioned, is that Lucy’s most probable borderline personality disorder has been highlighted by the very behavior her symptoms (as reported by the author) have triggered here in this on-line group … the splitting, the triangulating, the idealization, the confusion, the outrage, the pity, the need to rescue, etc, etc. It’s amazing. Anyone who has ever worked, or lived, with these very tortured human beings knows all too well this transference /countertransference that is expereienced among caregivers (or in our case, “carers”). It’s actually a good indication of her likely diagnosis and, most importantly, of the feelings Lucy had for herself and her experience of life … as a way to better understand her. On an entirely different and lighter note, while admitting to a hopeless obsession with the American Idol tv show, I have to add that Cynthia, the fellow blogger here, reminds me of the infamous judge, Simon Cowell. People cringe when he speaks, and many downright hate him, but much … not all, but much …of what he says is absolutely right-on. He just isn’t as tactful as he would need to be to avoid disturbing peoples’ sensibilities. It sells a lot of television, though … and it keeps people attached to blogs that could otherwise end up rather boring if such folks kept quiet.

This blog and all our comments just prove how ready we all are to believe anything on paper, and labelled as memoir, must be truth.
Writers give us their perspective, not the gospel. AP and LG “chose” what they thought important. Both enhanced or left out what they wanted. Both, I’m sure, transformed characters and personalities to suit their purposes. As readers we have to understand that.
It’s sad we keep judging people just because we “read” something…

Regardless of what Lucy’s sister feels to be a theft of grief, the fact remains that Lucy lived a life full of friends and a surrogate family, which included Ann.
Yes, both books are opinion. Opinions based on experiences. The memoirs share the same subject: Lucy.
Good or bad, right or wrong, what makes both of these memoirs books that will continued to be read a long time down the road is the mere fact that the other book exists.

I have suffered from distorted perception about my looks for years….. after almost 2 yrs of therapy and medication I can say that I am healed, eventhough i understand that i’ve also learned to live with it and not pay attention to it.
I know how it feels to suffer cuz you think your not normal.
Lucy had a very different problem. She was for real disfigured so not even therapy was going to make her believe she was not.
A lot of courage is necessary to live with peace of mind after her illness.
I read the book and felt a lot of compassion and understanding for her.
I wish she could’ve felt better about herself though.
Im nobody to judge her or anybody else…
I just hope she didnt suffer that much, and the mostly the cruelty of children when she was little…. what really damaged her emotional side… from the beginning…
Lucy rest in peace.
And thank you for writin that book for all those who suffer from any selfimage disorder.
We are learning from it, that we dont have to feel down or waste our lives for supercicialities.
I defenitely recommend this book to every one.

I, too, have just finished reading Truth and Beautty and found it to be haunting. I agree with some of the comments that the book is more of a catharsis and tribute to mourning than seems obvious at first. For anyone who has had toxic or otherwise friendships that leave them questioning the relationship and the role of each person, this book delves deep into the intricacies of that type of relationship. I believe it is Ann Patchett’s way to assess the friendship, what she got out of it, and what she put into it. Of course she mourned her friend who possessed many qualities and annoyances that she did not possess and that may have been part of the original attraction. The same may be true for Lucy for what she got out of the relationship with Ann – hence the endearments, ‘my pet’, etc. For all its complexity, I believe it’s a book Ann HAD to write in order to deal with Lucy’s death and assess (and perhaps justify) her role in the friendship.

Again, here is a quote from Ann Patchett HERSELF on page 165 of TRUTH AND BEAUTY (hard copy):
“Whenever I asked Lucy if she wanted to exchange pages with me, she
wasn’t interested and I didn’t push the point. I knew that by writing a
novel, she felt like she was straying onto my turf.
FOR LUCY IT WAS VERY IMPORTANT THAT OUR PROFESSIONAL CAREERS REMAIN SEPARATE.”
So Lucy felt bad even WRITING A NOVEL because she felt it would be blurring some boundary with Ann. Yet here Patchett has infiltrated Lucy’s story completely. Now anyone who reads Autobiography automatically runs off to read the infinitely inferior Truth and Beauty.
Does Ann truly believe this is what Lucy would have wanted??? Does ANYONE believe that this is what Lucy would have wanted?

I agree with Julie (October 2, 2007). Having just finished Truth & Beauty, I found myself caring deeply about both of these women. I am awed both by Lucy’s spirit and Ann’s patience. They were a gift to one another, and I think Patchett’s book portrays this. I am also saddened by the dark judgmental tone many contributors to the site have taken. Why does someone always have to be wrong or be the bad one? Ann depicts two different and vulnerable human beings brought together by a shared love/interest–writing and the art of writing. The longer I live the more I realize how flawed we all are and how very necessary it is that we love each other in spite of–pehaps because of–our very human failures.

I just finished listening to Truth and Beauty on CD read by Ann Patchett and I thought it was a mesmerizing story! It brought me to the internet and this website. Your comments and opinions were also interesting. I found myself disagreeing heartily with Cynthia’s perceptions of Ann and Lucy’s friendship! I thought it was an honest look at a friendship over the years that involved successes, failures, and addiction. I do not think Ann portrayed herself as the savior and I do not think she portrayed Lucy as hopelessly selfish. It is the truth of true friendship: sometimes it’s not fair or equal or even pretty, but you love your friends in spite of that. I definitely saw the truth and beauty in their relationship and it touched me deeply.

how interesting that this discussion has been more-or-less continually active for 3 1/2 years now-slowed some, to be sure, but still alive. and it’s gratifying to note the general high level of intelligence and erudition here. like most commenters, i found this site after becoming intrigued by l.g. after reading a of a f. she certainly is one compelling woman to maintain this much personal juju after several years post-mortem. unlike most of the other posters, i am male, and unlike ALL the other posters(i think) i have a physical impairment/disability-from childhood, like lucy-comparable in psychosocial consequences to hers. also, she and i are almost exact contemporaries. like her, i had early interaction with medicos, like her i was taunted and mocked by my peers, like her i had occasional exhilerating glimpses of ‘normality’, like her i felt like a social and sexual pariah, and like her i blossomed(less so than her) in college…’a of a f’ was also interesting to me because i recognize certain behaviors in myself that lucy displayed. like her, i can’t keep people’s names straight or sometimes even remember them at all. this is due to what i call quasi-sociopathology(i’m not a true sociopath, since i am capable of empathy). it comes from being teased for having a real defect, but being unable to help it; other people come to seem not quite ‘real’. you know any intimacy is only likely to go just so far, so why bother? and also like l.g., i engaged in ‘testing’ behaviour, boundary-pushing with my friendships, passive-aggression, etc…being disabled or disfigured is a REAL problem in this life. it’s not necessarily going to be substantially helped by any amount of ‘counseling'(that great secular panacea). i’d also caution against hauling out the old boilerplate condemnation of Our Capitalist, Patriarchical Society And It’s Toxic Emphasis On Physical Beauty. that’s an evasion, for the most part; it keeps one from examining one’s OWN physicality in light of beauty and ugliness.
still, i found myself longing for a good, clear, close up photo of lucy. because in the one’s online, she doesn’t look bad at all-certainly not someone who warrants the instant, strong reactions from others she describes in her book. i wonder if she didnt exagerate some? also, having loads and loads of friends and lovers(especially) doesn’t quite jibe with someone really seriously facially disfigured. think about it-how many such people do you see in a year? not bloody many. they’re around, but they STAY HOME, because being out in public is too awful.
anyway…lucy grealy remains a woman of mystery.

I have a disability and in my junior year of college, I became friends with someone who appears to be very similar to Lucy. It was the most engrossing friendship that I have ever had both in a negative and positive way. There were times when I was so annoyed by the depiction of Lucy and her behaviors that I had to stop because it reminded me too much of my friend. I can sympathize with Patchett because it is almost like you need to purge yourself of the things that happened to you when you are in a friendship such as the one that she describes. However, after now reading Lucy’s sister’s feelings on the book, I do question the circumstances behind T & B’s publication. I wonder if Grealy’s family really was kept in the dark. If so, that seems dishonest and doesn’t honor the part of the relationship that Pachett likes. I feel as though the book is both a love letter to a friend and also rails against Grealey who she could be at times. I’m not sure Patchett ever decided what she wanted the book to be a love letter or a chance to express her rage. While friendships are complicated in this way, and it appears that certainly this one was. . .I would have to agree with the above author who agreed with Pachett’s need to write it but not publish it. This is not to say that I didn’t enjoy it and find it haunting.

I can’t believe you are still getting comments on this thread… then again, yes I can, since I am just now sitting down to read Ann Patchett’s book. (A day late and a dollar short, that’s me!)
Some of the harsh, moralistic judgments and intolerance exhibited in this thread are quite jarring, but it gives us a good idea of what Lucy had to deal with in her life. She could not simply live her life as an ordinary human being, but instead became a SYMBOL for other people’s psychological/personal projections (including Patchett’s). What a heavy burden this must have been.
Thanks for providing this forum for discussing the book in detail.

Ditto. Soemone finally says it out loud! Find a way (for Pete’s Sake) to find happiness. The rest of us did. It is not us, the reader who is arrogant, un-understanding, and self-absorbed, it is the writer.

If you want to see Lucy SPEAK FOR HERSELF, she can be found on Charlie Rose in 1994. Scroll to the 38minute 20 second mark.
She comes across much more like the graceful voice of her OWN book rather than the trainwreck portrayed by Patchett:
http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=lucy+grealy&emb=0#

I just finished reading Autobiography of a Face for for the first time this weekend. I never knew that Lucy had died because I didn’t read all the quotes on the back of the book. The book was actually a course requirement for a class my daughter took in college. I thought the writing was beautiful and easy and full of detail that I could encompass. Looking at this thread (thanks to my daughter) I never realized how many different ways we could construe this story telling into a way of feeling so many challenging, contrived, ignorant, beautiful, angry, compelling emotions . I don’t like Cynthia but I think she raises some great questions. I have not yet read T&B, will I be disappointed? I for one really wanted Lucy to say she wrote the truth. (I know she cant) I don’t think she did. She wrote a great book.It entertained us and it ultimately consumed us..