A random collection of over 1910 books and audiobooks authored by or about my transgender, intersex sisters, and gender-nonconforming persons all over the world. I read some of them, and I was inspired by some of them. I met some of the authors and heroines, some of them are my best friends, and I had the pleasure and honor of interviewing some of them. If you know of any transgender biography that I have not covered yet, please let me know.
Original title: "Paradiset er ikke til salg: Trangen til at være begge køn" (Paradise is not for sale: The urge to be both sexes) by Preben Hertoft and Teit Ritzau.
"The book sheds light on the concept of gender identity as reflected by transvestites and transsexuals, and attempts to demystify these concepts by means of a series of 'case stories' about how it has really happened to people who have had sex reassignment surgery – among them the famous Christine Jørgensen and Lili Elbe. Preben Hertoft was for many years the head of the Department of Sexology. Teit Ritzau is a doctor and film director."
1984,
Christine Jorgensen,
Danish,
Lili Elbe,
Preben Hertoft,
Teit Ritzau,
Full title: "Wondrous Transformations: A Maverick Physician, the Science of Hormones, and the Birth of the Transgender Revolution" by Alison Li.
"Harry Benjamin (1885–1986), a German-born endocrinologist, was a pivotal figure in the development of transgender medicine. He was a physician to transgender pioneers such as Christine Jorgensen, the 1950s "Ex-GI" turned "Blonde Beauty" media sensation, and in turn, she and other collaborators helped to shape Benjamin's influential 1966 book, The Transsexual Phenomenon. Alison Li's much-needed biography of Benjamin chronicles his passion for hormones and his lifelong interest in sexology.
Drawing from extensive research in archival documents, secondary sources, and interviews, Li tells the story of Benjamin's early ventures in gerontology and his later work with over a thousand transgender patients. Benjamin's contributions to treatment, education, research, and networking helped to create the institutional foundations of transgender medicine. Moreover, they set the stage for a radical reconsideration of gender identity, challenging us to reflect upon what it is to be male or female and to envision moving beyond these long-held categories."
2023,
Alison Li,
Christine Jorgensen,
English,
Full title: "How Sex Changed: A History of Transsexuality in the United States" by Joanne Meyerowitz.
"How Sex Changed is a fascinating social, cultural, and medical history of transsexuality in the United States. Joanne Meyerowitz tells a powerful human story about people who had a deep and unshakable desire to transform their bodily sex. In the last century when many challenged the social categories and hierarchies of race, class, and gender, transsexuals questioned biological sex itself, the category that seemed most fundamental and fixed of all.
From early twentieth-century sex experiments in Europe, to the saga of Christine Jorgensen, whose sex-change surgery made headlines in 1952, to today’s growing transgender movement, Meyerowitz gives us the first serious history of transsexuality. She focuses on the stories of transsexual men and women themselves, as well as a large supporting cast of doctors, scientists, journalists, lawyers, judges, feminists, and gay liberationists, as they debated the big questions of medical ethics, nature versus nurture, self and society, and the scope of human rights."
2002,
Christine Jorgensen,
English,
Joanne Meyerowitz,
USA,
Full title: "Christine Jorgensen: The Power of Transgender Visibility (Transgender Empowerment Book 4)" by Leigh Goodwin.
"Christine Jorgensen is known as the Army GI that became a Beauty Queen in the early 1950s. She was an early open transgender woman, an early transgender advocate and she set a good example of work ethic for transgender people. Suffering from classic gender dysphoria, she was not the first to receive sexual reassignment surgery but was one of the first Americans to receive her surgeries supplemented with hormone replacement therapy medication. As is sometimes common with goal of obtaining sexual reassignment surgeries Miss Jorgensen had to travel abroad to receive some surgical treatments. Christine Jorgensen played a major role in helping to create transgender visibility by her openness about her gender identity in both her professional and her personal life."
2018,
Christine Jorgensen,
English,
Leigh Goodwin,
Full title: "Sex Changes: The Politics of Transgenderism" by Pat Califia.
"Sex Changes: The Politics of Transgenderism is Califia's meticulously researched book based on an astute reading of the available literature and in-depth interviews with gender transgressors who "opened their lives, minds, hearts, and bedrooms to the gaze of strangers."
Writing about both male-to-female and female-to-male transsexuals, Califia examines the lives of early transgender pioneers like Christine Jorgensen, Jan Morris, Renee Richards, and Mark Rees, contemporary transgender activists like Leslie Feinberg and Kate Bornstein, and partners of transgendered people like Minnie Bruce Pratt. Califia scrutinizes feminist resistance to transsexuals occupying women's space, the Christian Right's backlash against transsexuals, and the appropriation of the berdache and other differently-gendered by gay historians to prove the universal existence of homosexuality. Finally, Sex Changes explores the future of gender."
1997,
Christine Jorgensen,
English,
Jan Morris,
Kate Bornstein,
Pat Califia,
Renée Richards,
Full title: "Sexual Metamorphosis: An Anthology of Transsexual Memoirs" by Jonathan Ames.
"In Sexual Metamorphosis, Ames presents the personal narratives of seventeen gender pioneers. Here is Christine Jorgensen, the first celebrity transsexual, greeting thousands of well-wishers from the stage of Madison Square Garden. Here is Caroline Cossey, former model and Bond (as in James) girl, being outed in the tabloid press.
Here is novelist and English professor Jennifer Finney Boylan discussing her impending transformation with her heartbroken spouse and supportive yet confused colleagues. The result is a fascinating and compulsively readable book, filled with anguish, introspection and courage."
2005,
Caroline Cossey,
Christine Jorgensen,
English,
Jennifer Finney Boylan,
Jonathan Ames,
Renée Richards,
Full title: "Marie parce que c'est joli" (Marie because it's pretty)
"Marie-Pierre's book is the authentic chronicle of a little boy who felt like a little girl, a little girl who became a woman, and a woman who, by dint of tenacity, finds success and meets love.
We follow Marie from her childhood in Algeria to the Carrousel cabaret where she becomes BAMBI, Coccinelle's friend, and the headliner of the show for twenty years.
We follow Marie because she knows how to tell us the simple and exhilarating story of a "transition" that upsets her love and triggers her interest in the university education that leads her to another profession, national education, where she obtains the academic degree and especially the recognition of her former students."
2007,
Bambi,
Christine Jorgensen,
Coccinelle,
France,
French,
Georges Burou,
Lili Elbe,
Marie-Pier Ysser,
Marie-Pierre Pruvot,
Michel Marie Poulain,
Roberta Cowell,
Full title: "The life of Christine Jorgensen: The first transgender woman you never heard about" by Jennifer Hopkins.
"The idea of an open and increasingly accepted LGBTQ+ community was inconceivable when Christine stood alone for what she believed in. She knew who she was deep down inside and never gave up in her quest for acceptance and to live in the way that made the most sense to her. On each page of this moving and thought-provoking transgender biography you’ll be introduced to a chapter of trans history that deserves to be retold."
The book covers the story of Christine Jorgensen (1926-1989), an American singer, actress, celebrity, and the most iconic figure of the transgender movement in the USA, if not in the whole world, famous for being the first world-famous person to have surgery sexual reassignment conducted in Denmark in the 1950s, inducted into Chicago's Legacy Walk celebrating LGBT history in 2012, honored in San Francisco's Rainbow Walk in 2014, and included in the National LGBTQ Wall of Honor at Stonewall National Monument in New York City in 2019.
2022,
Christine Jorgensen,
English,
Jennifer Hopkins,
Full title: "Transgender Role Models and Pioneers" by Barbra Penne.
"While transgender people have become more visible and gained a measure of acceptance from our cisnormative society in recent years, the need for trans role models to inspire young transgender people is still very real.
This title profiles a host of accomplished transgender people who have made their names in a wide range of fields, including sports, politics, activism, entertainment, and the arts. It includes historical pioneers - such as Christine Jorgensen, Marsha P. Johnson, and Sylvia Rivera - as well as present-day figures - such as Lana and Lilly Wachowski, Kye Allums, and Laverne Cox. A valuable resource for an underserved community."
2016,
Barbra Penne,
Christine Jorgensen,
English,
Kye Allums,
Lana Wachowski,
Laverne Cox,
Lilly Wachowski,
Marsha P. Johnson,
Sylvia Rivera,
Full title: "Becoming a Woman: A Biography of Christine Jorgensen" by Richard F. Docter.
"Discover Christine Jorgensen’s remarkable, inspirational journey to become the woman she always knew she should have been. Becoming a Woman: A Biography of Christine Jorgensen provides fascinating insights about the woman who opened doors - and minds - on behalf of sexual minorities.
This book chronicles Christine’s drive, ability to solve problems, immense determination, and just plain luck as she transformed herself into her true gender - and reveals facets of her personality previously undisclosed by other biographies of her life."
The book covers the story of Christine Jorgensen (1926-1989), an American singer, actress, celebrity, and the most iconic figure of the transgender movement in the USA, if not in the whole world, famous for being the first world-famous person to have surgery sexual reassignment conducted in Denmark in the 1950s, inducted into Chicago's Legacy Walk celebrating LGBT history in 2012, honored in San Francisco's Rainbow Walk in 2014, and included in the National LGBTQ Wall of Honor at Stonewall National Monument in New York City in 2019.
2007,
Christine Jorgensen,
English,
Richard F. Docter,
The book was published in 1067, and it had many re-editions, including the one in 2000 with the introduction by Susan Stryker.
It covers the story of Christine Jorgensen (1926-1989), an American singer, actress, celebrity, and the most iconic figure of the transgender movement in the USA, if not in the whole world, famous for being the first world-famous person to have surgery sexual reassignment conducted in Denmark in the 1950s, inducted into Chicago's Legacy Walk celebrating LGBT history in 2012, honored in San Francisco's Rainbow Walk in 2014, and included in the National LGBTQ Wall of Honor at Stonewall National Monument in New York City in 2019.
When a slender young woman stepped off a plane from Denmark to be greeted by howling reporters and an outraged American public, nobody expected that it would be one of the biggest moments in the history of transgender women.
1967,
2000,
Christine Jorgensen,
English,
