Perspective

Audre is the author and main character of the book. The book tracks Audre from early childhood to adulthood, cataloguing her development generally and her relationships with women specifically. Audre is naturally creative, headstrong, defiant, private and emotionally vulnerable. Her creativity comes out throughout the book, in her poetic writings and her attraction to the written word. She is headstrong, refusing to despair in a culture that despises her. She speaks out against oppression when she can and lives freely elsewhere when speaking out will do no good. She is defiant as well, because she ultimately refuses to be defined by those around her and stands out even among other lesbians and feminists as someone with her own, unique perspective that she consistently insists has something to contribute that no other perspective has.

Her perspective is primarily that of the woman I've just described. Although her vulnerability and...