Somebody Somewhere: Breaking Free from the World of Autism - Softcover

Williams, Donna

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0385255004 ISBN 13: 9780385255004

Publisher: Doubleday of Canada, 1995

Synopsis

In her first book, Nobody Nowhere, Donna Williams gave readers an incredible and unprecedented guided tour of the world of autism--a mysterious and little-understood condition.  From her earliest years, Donna's world was dominated by disembodied patterns, sound, color, and movement.  Cut off from her emotions and unable to make any true connections with other people, Donna lived largely in isolation, avoiding the incomprehensible actions of others yet yearning to be normal.  After she endured twenty-five years of imprisonment, a diagnosis of autism enabled her to take the first steps toward freedom, to begin the arduous trek from her "world under glass" to the real world.

Somebody Somewhere chronicles the four years since Donna's diagnosis and continues the journey she began in Nobody Nowhere.  Certain that she can no longer survive by straddling two opposing worlds, Donna vows to abandon entirely the comforting isolation of her universe of one.  The decision has brought both agonies and rewards.  She describes her trial by fire as she abandons the two alternate identities she used to hide behind, Carol and Willie, and goes forth nakedly as Donna alone.  She recounts her intensive sessions with her therapist, where she learns devastating truths behind her misconceptions of the real world.  She overcomes the prejudice of teachers and classmates in her quest to obtain a degree in education and recounts her breakthrough working with autistic children.  She comes to terms with the unwelcome --and for someone with autism, the particularly horrifying--demands of instant celebrity when her first book becomes an international bestseller.  She describes the pain and joy of recognizing for the first time her own emotions.  She learns to own her self and to love the person she discovers in the mirror.  Most poignantly of all, she learns she can at last reach out to others for friendship and finds the pleasure of a "special-ship" with a kindred soul.

Once again, Donna Williams proves herself a gifted gatekeeper, that rare individual who can illuminate a shadow world that continues to be deeply misunderstood, who can shatter the myths of autism and rise above its greatest challenges.  Donna's journey is far from over, but readers will cheer her tenacity, eloquence, and courage.

About this title

Review:

"This book deserves every superlative a reviewer can muster."
-The Globe and Mail

"To be able to do what [Donna Williams] has done, by age 27, and to write about it so poignantly and so articulately is to function on a higher level than most 'normal' folk achieve in a lifetime."
-Boston Globe

"By illuminating her own unique perceptions, she allows us to understand our own perceptions as never before...And oh, can she write."
-The New York Times Review of Books

"The artistically gifted Williams continues to build a bridge between 'my' world and 'the'world."
-Publishers Weekly

"Somebody Somewhere...provides a shining light into the dark mystery of autism."
-Detroit Free Press

From the Author:

What Donna says about writing Autobiography
Why write about oneself?
Everyone has a different reason.

I wrote the first of my four autobiographical works, Nobody Nowhere, on the verge of suicide after a wild half-crazy life with abuse, homelessness and ultimately hope for belonging only to find I was terrified of real closeness. I had a last inkling of hope that I couldn't truly say I'd tried my hardest to cope if I'd never fully disclosed the nature of my own private world. So I wrote out everything that mattered in my feelings and decided to give it to one child psychiatrist in the hope they could tell me what kind of mad I was and whether there was hope for answers and belonging. My intention was to then shred it, burn it and leave this world. Instead it was passed on to his colleague, then from her to her publisher, from him to an agent and from there out into the world it became a number one international bestseller. But why write three more?

My second autobiography, Somebody Somewhere is so completely different to the first and exposed a world of such different, forgotten citizens of the world, that the story had to be told, to give a voice to the voiceless, to be a starting point for solidarity and building bridges. It too became a number one international bestseller.

The third work, Like Color to The Blind exposed three very controversial areas that I felt strongly about; the visual fragmentation of visual perceptual disorders, the importance of augmented and alternative communication systems for voiceless people and the search for selfhood buried underneath stored learning, something so many people struggle with in silence until its often too late.

The fourth book, Everyday Heaven was about the simultaneous discovery of sexuality, journeys in orientation and at the same time coping with loss in a two year span in which I lost three of the closest people in my life.

So I wrote each for very different reasons, to hope and to survive, to shout and to stay sane.

About this edition

• Publisher: Doubleday of Canada
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 0385255004
• ISBN 13: 9780385255004
• Binding: Paperback