My Left Foot - Hardcover

Christy Brown was born in 1932. He was one of 23 children born to a Dublin bricklayer. A victim of cerebral palsy, he could not control his speech or his movement, apart from his left foot. This enabled him to paint and type this autobiography. He later wrote an autobiographical novel, Down all the Days, which was very successful. His novels include A Promising Career, A Shadow on Summer and Wild Grow the Lillies, and he also published his poetry in Collected Poems. Christy Brown died in 1981.

Conor Mullen was an inspired choice to read this classic story of triumph over physical disability, first published in 1954. Within minutes, Mullen's Dublin accent and his total comfort with the text have made you completely forget that you're not listening to the real Christy Brown, an Irish painter who learned to paint with his foot because his hands were disabled. The first half of the autobiography is a fascinating chronicle of Christy's childhood with 22 siblings, his loneliest moments, his emerging skills as a painter and writer, and his pilgrimage to Lourdes. When the narrative stalls in the latter third, Mullen, not the material, carries the listener to the finish. D.B. © AudioFile 2005, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine