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Six books about trans men, and why you should read them
Elliot Page best summed it up at the end of Pageboy: “Taking a deep breath, exhaling down to my toes, I wanted to hold to the feeling, to pocket the joy… I sensed I was heading in the right direction”. To be himself was the right direction, the past simply a mirage shed in the media spot-light for everyone to avail themselves of, this new Elliott the real person beneath the veneer. Pageboy is not a hagiography of transition, it an unburdening of that past, with the future written on the last page to inspire. In writing this my hope is to overcome the erasure of trans men in the narratives I and many trans writers often promote, that the real victims of gender critical beliefs are trans women. In reality, as Page outlines clearly, the social expectation to be her was the iron prison bringing him pain and suffering, and even when his reality shifted people denied him his inherent manhood. These six books shed light on trans men and mascs, showing that rather than being an after thought their experiences are rooted in the history of trans and queer emancipation.
Karl Baer’s 1907 autobiography published under the name N O Body titled Memoirs of a Man’s Maiden Years details Karl’s frustration with being trapped as a girl within conservation German society, denied an education capable of making a living other than menial work and motherhood. It is an…
