Vincent, Norah

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Vincent, Norah

PERSONAL: Female. Education: Williams College, B.A.

ADDRESSES: Home—New York, NY. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Viking Publicity, 375 Hudson St., New York, NY 10014.

CAREER: Freelance journalist and writer. Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles, CA, syndicated columnist for op-ed page; Baltimore Sun, Baltimore, MD, regular contributor of book reviews and essays; Salon.com, biweekly columnist, 2001; Village Voice, New York, NY, writer of "Higher Ed" column, 1999–2001; Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, senior fellow.

WRITINGS:

NONFICTION

(Compiler, with Chad Conway) The Instant Intellectual, Hyperion (New York, NY), 1998.

Self-Made Man: One Woman's Journey into Manhood and Back Again, Viking (New York, NY), 2006.

Contributor to periodicals, including the Los Angeles Times, Baltimore Sun, Village Voice, Houston Chronicle, Advocate, Boston Globe, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, New Republic, Newsday, and the New York Times.

SIDELIGHTS: Freelance journalist Norah Vincent has contributed to numerous periodicals, and also wrote a regular column for the op-ed page of the Los Angeles Times, a job from which she took a leave of absence in order to spend eighteen months posing as a man. The idea came to her when she went out dressed as a male one night to see if she could get away with it, and upon finding herself successful, she realized it was a golden opportunity to get a first-hand glimpse at how differently men are treated in society. Vincent's naturally deep voice and five-foot-ten-inch height assisted her in the transformation, as well as a bodybuilding routine and the addition of fake stubble on her face. Self-Made Man: One Woman's Journey into Manhood and Back Again recounts the story of Vincent's experiences, which ranged from learning how to carry herself and behave in a masculine manner, to what happened when she went on dates, to the nervous breakdown she suffered at the end of her experiment. Regina Marler, in a review for the Advocate, called the book a "fascinating and oddly poignant story of that journey into masculinity, which ended up revealing as much about women as about men." Vincent told Marler: "I learned that gender identity runs very deep in all of us, very near the center of our sense of self." A reviewer for Publishers Weekly noted Vincent's "sharp powers of observation and crisp writing." Lev Grossman, reviewing for Time, wrote: "This isn't a we-are-the-world book in which Vincent rejoices in our common humanity. It's too subtle for that, too smart and too honest. If anything, she found the gender gap to be even more unleapable than she had expected." In a review for Library Journal, Jack Forman dubbed the book "an often humorous, incisive, and fascinating account."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Vincent, Norah Self-Made Man: One Woman's Journey into Manhood and Back Again, Viking (New York, NY), 2006.

PERIODICALS

Academic Questions, winter, 2000, Carol Iannone, "Books, Articles, and Items of Academic Interest," p. 90.

Advocate, February 14, 2006, Regina Marler, "Lord of Illusion: Author and Former Advocate Columnist Norah Vincent on Self-Made Man, her Engrossing New Book about Passing As Male for 18 Months," p. 56.

Booklist, December 15, 2005, Vanessa Bush, review of Self-Made Man, p. 8.

Entertainment Weekly, January 20, 2006, Jennifer Reese, "Going for Bloke: In Her Would-be Exposé, Self-Made Man Norah Vincent Secretly Poses As a Man," p. 72.

Kirkus Reviews, November 15, 2005, review of Self-Made Man, p. 1226.

Library Journal, January 1, 2006, Jack Forman, review of Self-Made Man, p. 140.

New York Times Book Review, January 22, 2006, David Kamp, "Male Like Me," p. 1.

Philadelphia Inquirer, February 22, 2006, Tanya Barrientos, review of Self-Made Man.

Publishers Weekly, November 14, 2005, review of Self-Made Man, p. 56; February 6, 2006, Daisy Maryles, review of Self-Made Man, p. 15.

Time, January 30, 2006, Lev Grossman, "Making a Man of Her: A Woman Puts on Stubble and Pants and Spends a Year Living, Bowling and Dating As a Guy," p. 64.