A Conversation About Happiness - The Story of a Lost Childhood

When Mikey Cuddihy was orphaned at the age of nine, her life exploded. She and her siblings were sent from New York to board at experimental Summerhill School, in Suffolk, and abandoned there. The setting was idyllic, lessons were optional, pupils made the rules. Joan Baez visited and taught Mikey guitar. The late sixties were in full swing, but with total freedom came danger. Mikey navigated this strange world of permissiveness and neglect, forging an identity almost in defiance of it. A Conversation About Happiness is a vivid and intense memoir of coming of age amidst the unravelling social experiment of sixties and seventies Britain.

About the author

Born in New York, Mikey Cuddihy was educated at Summerhill School in Suffolk. She later studied fine art at Edinburgh College of Art and Chelsea School of Art. An art lecturer at the University of Brighton, Mikey is an acclaimed artist and writer.

Summary

Orphaned at the age of nine, Mikey Cuddihy left the US to board at the experimental Summerhill School. Like Hideous Kinky, this memoir describes coming of age in the strange and dangerous world of the unravelling social experiment of the late 1960s.

Foreword

Orphaned at the age of nine, Mikey Cuddihy left the US to board at the experimental Summerhill School. Like Hideous Kinky, this memoir describes coming of age in the strange and dangerous world of the unravelling social experiment of the late 1960s.

Report

Written with a cool-eyed compassion, this is a fascinating examination of the bittersweet experiments of '60s child rearing, of which Cuddihy was both a victim and a beneficiary. I found it deeply moving. Esther Freud

Product details

• Authors: Mikey Cuddihy
• Publisher: Atlantic Books
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 03.04.2014
• EAN: 9781782393146
• ISBN: 978-1-78239-314-6
• No. of pages: 272
• Dimensions: 137 mm x 199 mm x 20 mm
• Weight: 318 g
• Subjects: Fiction > Narrative literature > Novel-like biographies; Humanities, art, music > History > Contemporary history (1945 to 1989); Non-fiction book > Politics, society, business > Biographies, autobiographies; BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Women, FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS / General, FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS / Life Stages / General, BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Personal Memoirs, Biography: general, FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS / Life Stages / School Age, Age groups: children, Relationships and families: advice and issues, Gender studies: women and girls