This Woman's Work

A profound and personal exploration of the intersections of womanhood, femininity, and creativity

This Woman's Work is a powerfully raw autobiographical work that asks vital questions about femininity and the assumptions we make about gender. Julie Delporte examines cultural artifacts and sometimes traumatic memories through the lens of the woman she is today--a feminist who understands the reality of the women around her, how experiencing rape culture and sexual abuse is almost synonymous with being a woman, and the struggle of reconciling one's feminist beliefs with the desire to be loved. She sometimes resents being a woman and would rather be anything but.

Told through beautifully evocative colored pencil drawings and sparse but compelling prose, This Woman's Work documents Delporte's memories and cultural consumption through journal-like entries that represent her struggles with femininity and womanhood. She structures these moments in a nonlinear fashion, presenting each one as a snapshot of a place and time--trips abroad, the moment you realize a relationship is over, and a traumatizing childhood event of sexual abuse that haunts her to this day. While This Woman's Work is deeply personal, it is also a reflection of the conversations that women have with themselves when trying to carve out their feminist identity. Delporte's search for answers in the turmoil created by gender assumptions is profoundly resonant in the era of #MeToo.


About the Author
Julie Delporte was born in Saint-Malo, France, in 1983. Her first graphic novel with Drawn & Quarterly was 2014's Everywhere Antennas. Journal, a collection of Delporte's diary comics, was published by Koyama Press in 2013. In 2011-2012, she was a fellow at the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction, Vermont. She has published a French children's book (Je suis un raton laveur), as well as some short pieces at L'employé du Moi (Belgium) and in various anthologies. Colored pencils and dogs with long ears are her favorite antidepressants. She presently resides in Montreal, Canada, where she publishes books and zines.