Look Me in the Eye: My Life with Asperger's
by John Elder Robison
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Book Summary Information
Author: John Elder RobisonEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2008-09-09
ISBN: 0307396185
Number of pages: 320
Publisher: Broadway
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Book Reviews of Look Me in the Eye: My Life with Asperger's
Book Review: Lessons I Learned from This Book about an Aspergoonian
Summary: 3 Stars
I am considering writing my own book about living with Asperger's syndrome, and I'm really glad to have read Robison's version. It gives me some valuable tips and insights. But I doubt that parents would want their children to read this book. It has a dark side.
*Tell the Grand Adventure Story*
Robison does this well, and he sets an example for other Aspies who might want to tell their stories. We can't all match Robison's technical genius and great commercial accomplishments, but any Aspie's life is so unique and challenging that it is potentially interesting. The trick, Aspies, is to do it late enough in life so that your Aspie emotions are under control, you can finally look back and understand why you irritated people, and you can write about it clearly and objectively. My book will be more of a tempest in a teapot than Robison's, like a Jane Austen novel with an oddball character trying to appear as normal, leading to some comical situations.
As you can see, I prefer the old, two-syllable "Aspie" to the new, pompous "Aspergian."
*Respect the Privacy of Others*
In his "Author's Note," Robison says that he uses pseudonyms where appropriate to avoid embarrassing people. Good idea.
*Accept Some Responsibility*
Here is where I begin to differ with Robison. He sets the tone, which he never grows out of, that because I was this poor Aspergian victim, anything that I did is OK. Yes, people should be more tolerant of our oddness. However, despite being "a little strange" (the last three words of the paperback version), we still have a basic understanding of right vs. wrong. Being born without social grace does not excuse intentionally harmful behavior. Robison equivocates a bit when he writes, in the postscript to the paperback, "no one was ever hurt by my shenanigans, and they provided a way for me to relieve frustrations harmlessly." In this ominous sentence, which suggests that the alternative was much worse, the word "harmlessly" is very important. Maybe he is not being completely honest with himself. Here's a small sampling of the pranks that he brags about: He tricks his mother, who is already living on the edge of sanity, into thinking that his little brother has been abducted. "She turned white." Has he considered how that might have impacted her mental health? And to stage a fake hanging over burning paint cans, "I had stolen the paint cans from a construction site down the road." And to lure police -- ultimately three police cruisers, a fire truck, half a dozen cars and pickups, two power company trucks, and an ambulance -- to the fire, he uses "MY linesman's telephone, which I had looted along with some other supplies from a visiting phone truck." (MY emphasis.) If he thinks stealing is harmless, what else has he done "harmlessly?" And has it occurred to him that he might have made emergency personnel unavailable for a real emergency? Then, after he makes the phone call using the phone circuit of a "least favorite" neighbor, we have this gem: "If they can trace the call, I said to myself, that jerk Ellis will get a visit tonight. He had a kid, too, a snotty little brat. Maybe they'll wake him up and ask him about this, I thought. Maybe they'll even arrest him. I snickered at the thought."
How comfortable it must be to not repent of anything. I'm not against pranks, just harmful ones, and when I write about my pranks, I will acknowledge, and accept responsibility for, any potential or real harm.
In Chapter 25, Robison defends introducing a friend, who lived in the town of Montague, as a Montagoonian. For a moment he begins to understand how he hurt his friend's feelings, then he stubbornly rejustifies Montagoonian. How would Robison like to be called an Aspergoonian? Which brings me to my final point.
*Don't Oversell Asperger's*
I'm aware that some psychologists regard Asperger's as part of a diversity of healthy mental states, not a disorder. I side with those who see it as a disorder that needs diagnosis and treatment, especially in childhood. Young Aspies need coaching! My grandson, whose Asperger's syndrome is more severe than mine, is benefitting from a much earlier diagnosis, and more help, than what I got.
At the end of Chapter 24, Robison writes, "So I'm not defective. In fact, in recent years I have started to see that we Aspergians are better than normal!" -- Which shows how easy it is to forget, after reaching a comfortable middle age, the hell that we went through as children. Robison works both sides of the ticket: His Asperger's sometimes handicaps him, sometimes makes him superior to ordinary people. Thus we should view him with both sympathy and awe. That's not wrong per se, and it has the nice (whether intended or not) side effect that reviewers fawn over him. The problem is, in setting himself on a pedestal, Robison oversells Asperger's. Many Aspies are not superior, and many superior people are not Aspies.
I must admit that Robison is more gifted than me and probably most Aspies. I have decided that Aspies with superior intelligence are Aspergoonians. So I have decreed, and so it shall be.
**
Well, this review is more negative than what I expected when I began to write. It's an interesting book -- thus my first observation, tell the grand adventure story. Robison certainly does that.
Summary of Look Me in the Eye: My Life with Asperger's
New York Times Bestseller?As sweet and funny and sad and true and heartfelt a memoir as one could find.?
?from the foreword by Augusten Burroughs
Ever since he was young, John Robison longed to connect with other people, but by the time he was a teenager, his odd habits?an inclination to blurt out non sequiturs, avoid eye contact, dismantle radios, and dig five-foot holes (and stick his younger brother, Augusten Burroughs, in them)?had earned him the label ?social deviant.? It was not until he was forty that he was diagnosed with a form of autism called Asperger?s syndrome. That understanding transformed the way he saw himself?and the world. A born storyteller, Robison has written a moving, darkly funny memoir about a life that has taken him from developing exploding guitars for KISS to building a family of his own. It?s a strange, sly, indelible account?sometimes alien yet always deeply human.
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