Out of the Ordinary: A Life of Gender and Spiritual Transitions
()
About this ebook
Now available for the first time—more than 50 years after it was written—is the memoir of Michael Dillon/Lobzang Jivaka (1915–62), the British doctor and Buddhist monastic novice chiefly known to scholars of sex, gender, and sexuality for his pioneering transition from female to male between 1939 and 1949, and for his groundbreaking 1946 book Self: A Study in Ethics and Endocrinology. Here at last is Dillon/Jivaka’s extraordinary life story told in his own words.
Out of the Ordinary captures Dillon/Jivaka’s various journeys—to Oxford, into medicine, across the world by ship—within the major narratives of his gender and religious journeys. Moving chronologically, Dillon/Jivaka begins with his childhood in Folkestone, England, where he was raised by his spinster aunts, and tells of his days at Oxford immersed in theology, classics, and rowing. He recounts his hormonal transition while working as an auto mechanic and fire watcher during World War II and his surgical transition under Sir Harold Gillies while Dillon himself attended medical school. He details his worldwide travel as a ship’s surgeon in the British Merchant Navy with extensive commentary on his interactions with colonial and postcolonial subjects, followed by his “outing” by the British press while he was serving aboard The City of Bath.
Out of the Ordinary is not only a salient record of an early sex transition but also a unique account of religious conversion in the mid–twentieth century. Dillon/Jivaka chronicles his gradual shift from Anglican Christianity to the esoteric spiritual systems of George Gurdjieff and Peter Ouspensky to Theravada and finally Mahayana Buddhism. He concludes his memoir with the contested circumstances of his Buddhist monastic ordination in India and Tibet. Ultimately, while Dillon/Jivaka died before becoming a monk, his novice ordination was significant: It made him the first white European man to be ordained in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.
Out of the Ordinary is a landmark publication that sets free a distinct voice from the history of the transgender movement.
Related to Out of the Ordinary
Related ebooks
Propa Propaganda Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Autobiography of an Androgyne Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMoving Forward Sideways Like a Crab Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Self: A Study in Ethics and Endocrinology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Winding Way Home Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Dying Days of Segregation in Australia: Case Study Yarrabah Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings30 Queer Lives: Conversations with LGBTQIA+ New Zealanders Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPassionate Uprisings: Iran's Sexual Revolution Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5The Dream-Chosen: Tales of the Kashallans, #1 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Country of Words: A Palestinian Journey from the Refugee Camp to the Front Page Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Epidemic Empire: Colonialism, Contagion, and Terror, 1817–2020 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Garden of Flowers and Weeds: A New Translation and Commentary on The Blue Cliff Record Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAbortion: a personal story, a political choice Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn the Province of the Gods Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hungry Ghosts Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsKingdom of Women Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSiddhartha Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5The Right to Be Lazy and Other Essays (Warbler Classics Annotated Edition) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBuying Buddha, Selling Rumi: Orientalism and the Mystical Marketplace Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRefusal to Eat: A Century of Prison Hunger Strikes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOut Here: An Anthology of Takatapui and LGBTQIA+ Writers from Aotearoa Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLiving without the Dead: Loss and Redemption in a Jungle Cosmos Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDisaster Anarchy: Mutual Aid and Radical Action Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Trial Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsQueer Life, Queer Love.: The second anthology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIranian Rappers and Persian Porn: A Hitchhiker's Adventures in the New Iran Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Selected Works of Voltairine de Cleyre Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLunatic Heroes: Memories, Lies and Reflections Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsJesus and the Eightfold Path Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Gender Studies For You
King, Warrior, Magician, Lover: Rediscovering the Archetypes of the Mature Masculine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5All About Love: New Visions Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Women Don't Owe You Pretty Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lost in Trans Nation: A Child Psychiatrist's Guide Out of the Madness Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5In the Next Room (or the vibrator play) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Transgender 101: A Simple Guide to a Complex Issue Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Communion: The Female Search for Love Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty Are Used Against Women Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Amateur: A True Story About What Makes a Man Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised as a Girl Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The End of Gender: Debunking the Myths about Sex and Identity in Our Society Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Period Power: Harness Your Hormones and Get Your Cycle Working For You Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The War Against Boys: How Misguided Policies are Harming Our Young Men Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5You're Cute When You're Mad: Simple Steps for Confronting Sexism Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Genesis of Gender: A Christian Theory Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Vagina: A re-education Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Boys & Sex: Young Men on Hookups, Love, Porn, Consent, and Navigating the New Masculinity Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5When Women Kill Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Not That Bad: Dispatches from Rape Culture Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Trans Life Survivors Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Man Enough: Undefining My Masculinity Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLetter to a Bigot: Dead But Not Forgotten Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sexuality and Slavery: Reclaiming Intimate Histories in the Americas Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTransforming: The Bible and the Lives of Transgender Christians Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Reviews for Out of the Ordinary
0 ratings0 reviews