Big Read: ‘Sitting Pretty’ by Rebekah Taussig

Tuesday, May 16, 2023
7:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Join us for a discussion on Rebekah Taussig’s Sitting Pretty at our Newport Branch. Pick up a copy at our Newport or Cold Spring branches or contact Amy Carroll at Acarroll@cc-pl.org to have a book reserved at another branch.

This program is part of Ensemble Theatre’s “Big Read”. For more information, visit NEA Big Read 2022-2023 | Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati (ensemblecincinnati.org).

Please note any accommodation requests in the Special Needs section of the registration form.

​If you have any questions, please contact Amy at Acarroll@cc-pl.org

Sitting Pretty

A memoir-in-essays from disability advocate and creator of the Instagram account @sitting_pretty Rebekah Taussig, processing a lifetime of memories to paint a beautiful, nuanced portrait of a body that looks and moves differently than most.

Growing up as a paralyzed girl during the 90s and early 2000s, Rebekah Taussig only saw disability depicted as something monstrous (The Hunchback of Notre Dame), inspirational (Helen Keller), or angelic (Forrest Gump). None of this felt right; and as she got older, she longed for more stories that allowed disability to be complex and ordinary, uncomfortable and fine, painful and fulfilling.

Writing about the rhythms and textures of what it means to live in a body that doesn’t fit, Rebekah reflects on everything from the complications of kindness and charity, living both independently and dependently, experiencing intimacy, and how the pervasiveness of ableism in our everyday media directly translates to everyday life.

Disability affects all of us, directly or indirectly, at one point or another. By exploring this truth in poignant and lyrical essays, Taussig illustrates the need for more stories and more voices to understand the diversity of humanity. Sitting Pretty challenges us as a society to be patient and vigilant, practical and imaginative, kind and relentless, as we set to work to write an entirely different story.

Newport Branch