Georgina Hambleton
Christy Brown - the life that inspired My Left Foot
Christy Brown - the life that inspired My Left Foot
It tells the amazing story of the writer and painter Christy (whose life was made into the Oscar winning motion picture My Left Foot). Christy Brown was born into a family of 22 children (of which only 13 survived). He was born with a serious disability; double athetiod cerebral palsy. Due to suffocation during birth, Christy's brain was permemenantly damaged, leading to his nervous system being severely affected. He could not walk, nor speak coherently - the only part of his body which he could control was his left foot.
For the first seven years of his life, his mother, Bridget Brown was told by doctors that he was a "mental defective", and would be best placed in a home. Christy's mother persevered, and she continued to read to him and teach him how to write in an attempt to help him become an independent person, she was sure there was a great spark of character and intelligence in her son which only needed be encouraged. One day, when he was only seven years old, Christy Brown rewarded his mother's great faith by writing the letter 'A' on the worn out slate floor on their family home. Her son went onto to write five books; a best selling memoir ( My Left Foot) and a novel (Down All the Days) a best seller in fourteen different countries. He also painted prolifically and wrote hundreds of letters
This is...
...
the first and only biography of Christy Brown which uses unpublished material of Brown's - his letters, unpublished writings,The book also includes interviews with people who worked on the set of the Oscar winning film My Left Foot ( the director, producer and supporting actor) and looks at how Daniel Day-Lewis created one of the most important performances on celluloid.