Where to start? I guess with the fact that this book is not what I thought it would be. It’s not bad, it’s just not what I expected. Let’s get the controversy out of the way: I don’t believe Lena molested her sister. The passage about ‘spreading open her vagina’ makes for very uncomfortable reading but, in my opinion, is very different from sexual abuse. Same gender curiosity in young children is different from sexual abuse, many have said that if this book was written by a male things would be different, but not if the male did what Lena did to his brother. Young children don’t even know what sex is. So, end of.
The thing is, I don’t relate to Lena Dunham. Or at least I thought I did until I read this book. I don’t get the drug use, I am very anti-drugs and always have been. I don’t even care if I come across as boring but mentioning casual drug use as if it is not a thing to me is irresponsible. Many people think drug use is ‘cool’ and ‘artistic’ but it’s not. Drugs ruin lives and society. Now go ahead and judge me for my controversial view: I don’t care. The book is full of sex: masturbation and sexual encounters. This also makes for uncomfortable reading. Not bad reading, just uncomfortable. Dunham seems to want to punish herself with jerks and bad sexual encounters. It’s a version of self-loathing and it made me want to pick her up and hug her. Then of course there is the fact that Dunham was raped. Rape is never fun to read about, but Dunham’s courage in telling her story is commendable. The book is full of brutal honesty.
I know that in many ways this review will seem like a bad review, it’s not. I still think Dunham is talented, amazing, brilliant: a trail blazer. We are similar in age and I also made a web series about young twenty-somethings struggling to find their way in life, though with less success than the juggernaut that is Girls. We are both writer/producers/actors/directors and I always thought that Dunham was so together. I think she is now and that is what is interesting about this book. After all of the self-loathing, punishing herself dating/having sex with men who treated her terribly and other self-destructive behaviour the book comes beautifully full circle: she no longer runs away from people and herself, she in many ways, becomes a grown up. She finally stops causing herself pain. While I related more to Amy Poehler and her awesome book, Yes Please, there is something here to learn. Dunham is unvarnished, naked, almost embarrassing in her honesty. Dunham has been called the voice of her generation many times. Truth is, she doesn’t speak for me or many people that I know. But the thing is: it doesn’t matter. She is still paving the way for women, still creating waves in the film and TV industry, still making progress in a brutal, sexist industry. It doesn’t matter that I don’t 100% relate to her: she is still awesome. I may not write endlessly about my vagina the way Dunham does but then, maybe my vagina just isn’t that interesting. There is a lot of stories of bad sex in this book, and I hope that other women who read it don’t think this is par for the course. It shouldn’t be.
This book is certainly worth a read. It really made me think and feel. This is essentially a collection of autobiographical essays which Dunham was paid £2.3m for by Random House. It is not as good as it could have been, and Dunham could have done with more editing, but she is certainly a talented writer and I am sure there will be more to come. As Dunham says in the book: “There is nothing gutsier to me than a person announcing that their story is one that deserves to be told, especially if that person is a woman,”
Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She’s Learned is available here.
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