Lady Sings the Blues - Penguin Modern Classics (Paperback)

Billie Holiday (author)

£9.99

Paperback 192 Pages
Published: 29/11/2018

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Synopsis

I've been told that no one sings the word 'hunger' like I do. Or the word 'love'.

Lady Sings the Blues is the inimitable autobiography of one of the greatest icons of the twentieth century.

Born to a single mother in 1915 Baltimore, Billie Holiday had her first run-in with the law at aged 13. But Billie Holiday is no victim. Her memoir tells the story of her life spent in jazz, smoky Harlem clubs and packed-out concert halls, her love affairs, her wildly creative friends, her struggles with addiction and her adventures in love. Billie Holiday is a wise and aphoristic guide to the story of her unforgettable life.

Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
ISBN: 9780241351291
Number of pages: 192
Weight: 148 g
Dimensions: 198 x 130 x 10 mm

MEDIA REVIEWS

Its value is in its witness to the grinding humiliation of the racism that tainted every moment of her louche life - John Lahr, London Review of Books

A wrenchingly authentic account of Holiday's turbulent trajectory from abused child to jazz genius - Jane Shilling, Daily Mail

Her troubles are long behind her now. Her genius however, shows no sign of dimming any time soon. - Nick Hornby, Sunday Times

A searing account of her life as a brilliant artist, a heroin addict, simultaneously worshipped as a siren of sorrow and persecuted by a legal system structured by systemic racism. Booze runs like a glimmering ribbon through these pages - she even makes moonshine from potato peelings while incarcerated - but Holiday emerges as a figure far more nuanced and human than her mythic image. - Guardian, Leslie Jamison