Essay Database

The Adoption Papers The story of Jackie Kay's life is as fascinating and complex as her literary works. The comparison is significant because several of Kay's pieces spring from her biography and they are all concerned with the intricate nature of identity. Kay's father was a black Nigerian visiting Edinburgh when he met Kay's white Scottish mother. After he returned to Nigeria, the mother discovered she was pregnant and decided to give up the child. …

…block our ability to communicate and get to know each other, especially because of the reductive and simple notions people have of these markers. As much as we may resist, we are still made in the eyes of others. Kay's work expresses a deep desire to allow for more complex pictures of identity and a hope that such an understanding may lead to greater acceptance of difference and to greater acts of communication and connection.