Mothertongues by Ceridwen Dovey and Eliza Bell – a genre-defying, collaborative marvel that brings the absurdity of motherhood to the page.
After sharing their artistic frustrations at the school gate, two women decide to take a risk. They decide to co-write a book about early motherhood. Off-colour, offbeat, off their heads, they begin. After all, what is motherhood if not messy, non-linear, multi-authored and potty-mouthed?
Together they gather scenes and songs, poems and text messages, insights and ephemera and, from the salvaged scraps of their daily lives. Their intimate collage includes absurd mothering, failing mothering and moving mothering. They imagine themselves in a future where women don’t always have to choose between art and motherhood.
These mothers are tired. They are busy. They are lucky. They talk. Perform. Categorise. Clown. They do sad dinner cabaret. They do heroic odyssey. They do motherhood the musical. They do it badly, they do it well, they keep on doing it as women do – comically, communally. They creatively, up-end ideas of genre and speak of motherhood anew.
Mothertongues is a comforting affirmation that women all share the same highs and lows of Motherhood. The same fears, expectations, pain, joy, love and the exhilaration of contributing to the next generation of human beings on this beautiful planet. This is a celebration of women’s greatest creations and the many idiosyncrasies of raising them to adulthood.
It also has reminders of the downside of procreation – the unbearable loss of a child from accident or illness or the in-uterine loss of an embryo whether intentional or not. The love of a good man or degradation by one who only takes a woman for his pleasure, control and violence.
There are many sides to this never-ending story regarding the procreation, birth and raising of a child. From the exhaustion of the early days to years of the continual juggling of child-raising and a career. Multitasking becomes an art in itself, achieved with humour and creativity.
Everyone and anyone can learn a lot from reading this quirky take on Parenthood. An essential book for all current and would-be childraisers.
ISBN:9781761043550
Mothertongues is available in paperback, e-book and audiobook
About Ceridwen Dovey and Eliza Bell
Ceridwen Dovey is a writer based in Sydney. She’s the author of several acclaimed works of fiction (Blood Kin, Only the Animals, In the Garden of the Fugitives, Life After Truth, Once More With Feeling) and non-fiction (On J.M. Coetzee: Writers on Writers and Inner Worlds Outer Spaces:The Working Lives of Others). Her non-fiction essays have been published by newyorker.com, the Smithsonian Magazine, WIRED, Vogue, the Monthly and Alexander, among many others. She’s the recipient of an Australian Museum Eureka Award, and the 2020 & 2021 UNSW Press Bragg Prize for science writing. Her latest book is Mothertongues, a work of literary fictionco-authored with Eliza Bell, and including original songs by Australian songwriter Keppie Coutts.
Eliza Bell is a teacher, writer and theatre actor, originally from America and now living permanently in Australia. Her theatre performances include:The Memory of Water, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, New Jerusalem, The Accident, Charles Mee’s Snow in June, Donnie Darko and Three Sisters. She trained at Studio Magenia Ecole de Mime in Paris and the Moscow Art Theatre, UC Berkeley and the ART Institute at Harvard University.
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