The Crying Book

Heather Christle

'A deeply felt and genuinely touching book' Esmé Weijun Wang author of The Collected Schizophrenias

'Spellbinding and propulsive' Leni Zeumas author of Red Clocks

'The Crying Book is a rigorous and urgent work but it reads like an intimate gift' Kaveh Akbar author of Calling a Wolf a Wolf

A DAZZLING MEDITATION ON TEARS

In this symphonic work of non-fiction Heather Christle explores the most human of behaviours: crying. What are tears made of? Why do people cry? And why is this common crucial act so rarely discussed? Christle unpacks the biological reasons for tears and investigates the influence of crying on art politics feminism race and culture all while opening up the intimate story of her own tears - from the suicide of her close friend to her family's history of depression to her pregnancies both planned and unplanned.

In these pages we meet a feminist artist who designs a gun that shoots frozen tears. A moth that takes sustenance from feeding on the tears shed by other animals. And beautifully impractical devices for dealing with grief such as the 'lachrymatory' an ancient receptacle into which it was hoped 'a mourner could let fall her hot tears'. While Christle enchants us with poetic snippets on these subjects a powerful investigation begins to accrue examining how the history of tears is tied up with racist violence with the stigma of mental illness and with the ways in which glib contemporary images of motherhood fail to reckon with how rich and complicated is actually is.

Brilliant witty and achingly honest Christle's book creates a mosaic of science history culture and personal experience to find new ways of understanding life and loss. The Crying Book is a deeply intimate tribute to the fascinating strangeness of tears - and the unexpected resilience of joy.

Honest intelligent rapturous and surprising The Crying Book is a poignant personal tribute to the astonishing strangeness of tears and the startling resilience of joy.

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