Name: Oranges are Not the Only Fruit
ISBN: 9780871131638

Jeanette Winterson

Innovative in style, its humour by turns punchy and tender, Jeanette Winterson's first novel, Oranges are Not the Only Fruit is a few days ride into the bizarre outposts of religious excess and human obsession. It's a love story, too. Winterson's adaptation of the novel was an internationally acclaimed television drama awarded a BAFTA for best drama and an RTS award in the same year; the Prix Italia; FIPA D'Argent at Cannes for best script; The Golden Gate in San Francisco and an ACE Award at the Los Angeles television festival.

Oranges are Not the Only Fruit

Lindy

There are different sorts of treachery, but betrayal is betrayal wherever you find it. She burnt a lot more than the letters that night in the backyard. I don't think she knew. In her head she was still queen, but not my queen any more, not the White Queen any more. Walls protect and walls limit. It is in the nature of walls that they should fall. That walls should fall is the consequence of blowing your own trumpet. 

No, he wouldn't kill me, soft-voiced men do not kill, they are clever. Their kind of violence leaves no visible mark. 

Elke Maasbommel

barbora

the escape into another story reminds us that we too are another story. not caught, not confined, not pre-destined, not only one gender or passion. learning to read yourself as a fiction as well as a fact is liberating.

sharkie

We read the bible as usual, and then told each other how glad we were that the Lord had brought us together. She stroked my head for a long time, and then we hugged and it felt like drowning. Then I was frightened but couldn't stop. There was something crawling in my belly. I had an octopus inside me.

People do go back, but they don't survive, because two realities are claiming them at the same time. Such things are too much. You can salt your heart, or kill your heart, or you can choose between the two realities. There is much pain here.

Syrina

Some men turn to whisky, some women turn to gin, But there ain't no better rapture than drinking the spirit in. Some men like their beer others like their wine, But open your mouth to the Spirit, if you want to feel fine.'

Not whisky rye not gin and dry not num and coke for me, Not brandy fizz but a Spiritual whizz puts the fire in me.'

Very often history is a means of denying the past.

“I’m your mother,” she said very quietly. “She was a carrying case.”

And she was serene, serene to the point of being bovine.

What is it about intimacy that makes it so very disturbing? 

I would cross seas and suffer sunstroke and give away all I have, but not for a man, because they want to be the destroyer and never be destroyed. That is why they are unfit for romantic love. There are exceptions and I hope they are happy. 

'There's this world,' she banged the wall graphically, 'and there's this world,' she thumped her chest. 'If you want to make sense of either, you have to take notice of both.'

In the library I felt better, words you could trust and look at till you understood them, they couldn't change half way through a sentence like people, so it was easier to spot a lie.

Of course that is not the whole story, but that is the way with stories; we make them what we will. It's a way of explaining the universe while leaving the universe unexplained, it's a way of keeping it all alive, not boxing it into time. Everyone who tells a story tells it differently, just to remind us that everybody sees it differently.

Very often history is a means of denying the past. Denying the past is to refuse to recognise its integrity. To fit it, force it, function it, to suck out the spirit until it looks the way you think it should. We are all historians in our small way.

People have never had a problem disposing of the past when it gets too difficult. Flesh will burn, photos will burn, and memory, what is that? The imperfect ramblings of fools will not see the need to forget. And if we can't dispose of it we can alter it. The dead don't shout. There is a certain seductiveness about what is dead. It will retain all those admirable qualities of life with none of that tiresome messiness associated with live things. Crap and complaints and the need for affection. 

So the past, because it is past, is only malleable where once it was flexible. Once it could change its mind, now it can only undergo change the lens can be tinted, tilted, smashed.

The New York Times–bestselling author’s Whitbread Prize–winning debut—“Winterson has mastered both comedy and tragedy in this rich little novel” (The Washington Post Book World). When it first appeared, Jeanette Winterson’s extraordinary debut novel received unanimous international praise, including the prestigious Whitbread Prize for best first fiction. Winterson went on to fulfill that promise, producing some of the most dazzling fiction and nonfiction of the past decade, including her celebrated memoir Why Be Happy When You Can Be Normal?. Now required reading in contemporary literature, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a funny, poignant exploration of a young girl’s adolescence. Jeanette is a bright and rebellious orphan who is adopted into an evangelical household in the dour, industrial North of England and finds herself embroidering grim religious mottoes and shaking her little tambourine for Jesus. But as this budding missionary comes of age, and comes to terms with her unorthodox sexuality, the peculiar balance of her God-fearing household dissolves. Jeanette’s insistence on listening to truths of her own heart and mind—and on reporting them with wit and passion—makes for an unforgettable chronicle of an eccentric, moving passage into adulthood. “If Flannery O’Connor and Rita Mae Brown had collaborated on the coming-out story of a young British girl in the 1960s, maybe they would have approached the quirky and subtle hilarity of Jeanette Winterson’s autobiographical first novel. . . . Winterson’s voice, with its idiosyncratic wit and sensitivity, is one you’ve never heard before.” —Ms. Magazine

Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

The pacing frustrated me soooo much that I ended up not liking it. The title and the last chapter made it a bit better.

Dora Tominic

Disclaimer: this is not a review.

The pacing frustrated me soooo much that I ended up not liking it. The title and the last chapter made it a bit better.

Saffy

turns out oranges are also not my favorite fruit

petrina

the latter half was the only part that seemed enjoyable to me. i almost dropped it bc most parts i couldn't understand or just couldn't picture or relate with. i grew up christian but in a very different culture of upbringing so most likely this just wasn't it for me! there were a lot of excerpts and lines that did stick with me and i love them <3 it was a journey for sure and i'm happy i continued to read it bc the story towards the end was very beautifully written. maybe i would've understood and appreciated it better if i understood the religious/biblical references. either way, it was an interesting read!

I would probably have understood this better if I understood the Biblical references. Nonetheless, a great read on religious trauma 

Describes the humorous adventures during the childhood of an eccentric girl, whose mother unsuccessfully tries to protect her from temptations

Anna 

this was definitely an interesting read, but I'd probably enjoy it more/understand it better if I'd read it in czech. there was a lot of religious and biblical terms that I didn't know and didn't understand the meaning of them. it's my fault as well, I was too lazy to translate them, but overall it was an interesting book about not only the salvation but the trauma of being religious and having religious parents can bring. and being gay in this environment as well. 
i definitely recommend this book, even though it's kinda slow from time to time.

"i want someone who will destroy and be destroyed by me." 

iris 

will I ever be the same again?

"i want someone who will destroy and be destroyed by me." 

This is the story of Jeanette, adopted and brought up by her mother as one of God's elect. Zealous and passionate, she seems seems destined for life as a missionary, but then she falls for one of her converts. At sixteen, Jeanette decides to leave the church, her home and her family, for the young woman she loves. Innovative, punchy and tender, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a few days ride into the bizarre outposts of religious excess and human obsession. With a new introduction by the author 'Witty, bizarre, extraordinary and exhilarating' The Times 'She is a master of her material, a writer in whom great talent abides' Vanity Fair 'Many consider her to be the best living writer in this language... In her hands, words are fluid, radiant, humming' Evening Standard 'A novel that deserves revisiting' Observer 'A wonderful rites-of-passage novel' Mariella Frostrup

Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit

This really had me giggling in public - Winterson has found such an effective way to tell the story (almost her own story) with a lot of humour. And the tragedy and sadness of it really sneaks up on you towards the end of the novel, drawing to a bittersweet ending.

Kendall McClain

Love, the writing was brilliant, creative metaphors especially in a religious context will do it for me every time! Lesbians in a religious space is simply too real and sad but so interesting to read about, just taking off a star because was hard to get into at the beginning but she slays

erika s

Ed Kay

Hilarious northern wit and a vividly drawn world that effectively skewers the hypocrisy of the religious. Contains the best description of a problem I have ever read:

"What constitutes a problem is not the thing, or the environment where we find the thing, but the conjunction of the two; something unexpected in a usual place (our favourite aunt in our favourite poker parlour) or something usual in an unexpected place (our favourite poker in our favourite aunt)."

This is a great classic, clearly an important piece of fiction. But still - it did not grasp me entirely.

Pondering thoughts while growing up with a religious parent, and being different.

There are a ton of messages that I heard before, but the way the author put them was nice, and affirmed my values.

Nota

Pondering thoughts while growing up with a religious parent, and being different.

There are a ton of messages that I heard before, but the way the author put them was nice, and affirmed my values.

“The unknownness of my needs frightens me. I do not know how huge they are, or how high they are, I only know that they are not being met. If you want to find out the circumference of an oil drop, you can use lycopodium powder. That’s what I’ll find. A tub of lycopodium powder, and I will sprinkle it on to my needs and find out how large they are. Then when I meet someone I can write up the experiment and show them what they have to take on.”

Ruby Long

Like most people I lived for a long time with my mother and father. My father liked to watch the wrestling, my mother liked to wrest≤ it didn't matter what." --Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit This is the story of Jeanette, adopted and brought up by her mother as one of God's elect. Zealous and passionate, she seems destined for life as a missionary, but then she falls for one of her converts. At sixteen, Jeanette decides to leave the church, her home and her family, for the young woman she loves. Innovative, punchy and tender, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a few days ride into the bizarre outposts of religious excess and human obsession. * With a new introduction by the author

Angbeen Abbas

i only bought this book because of the Gay Content but im glad i did because i loved it so much

Raag Sudha

I just finished the book and am not sure what to think about it. There are some very interesting excerpts in it, but other parts are just strange and uncomprehendable. I think its one of those books which have quite a bit to analyse and think about but, as a read it was just not enjoyable. I liked the autobiographical style of the book and reading about how messed up the protagonist's puritan and orthodox, fundamentalist Christian upbringing was/is. But the strange parables/non-linear narrative style threw me off and not in a good way, in a more disengaging and boring way. The discontinuity and jarring fragmentation of the novel rubbed me the wrong way and made me more frustrated than amenable to the character's life trajectory.

I think what I'm most disappointed by is the fact that this is supposed to be an example of a stellar LGBTQ book... Seems like the standards set for LGBTQ are quite low. Suffice to say that I was definitely oversold on the book and expected much more than what I ultimately got. Much hype over nothing.

Flavia Louise

4 stars
A bit of a different read for sure. I really didn't like my edition's introduction.

Kwan Ann Tan

Listened in the office today & was so surprised... this is SO GOOD

Risa C

An intimate, yet lofty coming of age tale that manages to explore themes of sexuality, religion, community, and one's identity amidst and within these concepts in such a tight word count. I'm a fan of Jeanette Winterson's writing, but I'll admit that I probably read through this too quickly or with too distracted a mindset to fully appreciate the thematic and philosophical nuances (plus my ebook had weird formatting issues), but Jeanette's story still made an impression on me and had me invested in her journey.. It's certainly a book I'm keen to reread, both to just enjoy Winterson's prose and dive deeper into its themes.

Astha Prakash

Beautifully chiseled sentences. I loved her writing style more than the narrative itself. I'm a fan!

Dorian Avers

This was a required read for a Gender and Sexualities class that I was taking in college. I really wanted to like this book, but Winterson's writing style made that hard. I started trying to read this book a couple months ago but would get confused and then disinterested. Eventually I decided to power through and finish the book at the cost of some understanding. Winterson has so many different story lines and tales in this book that it is hard to focus and comprehend one thing before she jumps to another topic. I think this is one of those stories that you pick up on something new every time you read it just because there is so much being thrown at you at one time. I can understand how this book won award(s) especially in the LGBTQ community because it is interesting and brings a new experience to an until recently, scarcely populated genre. However, if you read this book just like any other it would be hard to award it because of how scattered and stream-of-conscious Winterson's writing is.

Carolina Lopes

I'm too lazy to write a review but I recommend it!

Brook

This book had me in tears, and as usually with Winterson, was a delight. Her words are like a river I swim in when I feel like I need more beauty in my life, and the story of a girl coming of age as a lesbian in the church is a personal one for me.

Oranges are Not the Only Fruit

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