Work
A Burst of Light
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About this work
A Burst of Light is Audre Lorde's 1988 collection of essays and journal entries, written as she lived with the cancer that would take her life. Fierce and clear, it joins the personal and the political: reflections on illness, survival, and the radical idea that caring for oneself is an act of self-preservation and warfare in an unjust world. It won the American Book Award.
About the author — Audre Lorde
Audre Lorde (1934 to 1992) was an American poet, essayist, and activist who described herself as a Black, lesbian, feminist, mother, warrior, poet. She turned her many identities and her confrontation with illness into some of the most galvanizing prose of her era.
1 quote from this work
People also ask
What is A Burst of Light about?
Audre Lorde's essays and journals on living with cancer, weaving the personal experience of illness together with reflections on race, power, and survival.
What is the famous quote from A Burst of Light?
Its most cited line declares that caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare, a foundation of modern self-care.
Why is the book important?
Because it reframed self-care as a form of resistance and gave a searching, honest account of facing mortality while continuing to fight for justice.