Finding Transcendence and Self-Worth

Hi, I'm Alyssa Advorney, and you're listening to NPR's Book of the Day . Laverne Cox's memoir covers a lot of topics. It begins with growing up in Alabama and winds its way to how Cox became one of the most famous transgender actors in Hollywood. It's called Transcendent, and it explores trauma and triumphs on her journey to healing. Cox spoke with NPR's Elsa Cheng . In twenty thirteen, when the Netflix series Orange is the New Black came out , the world met the character Sophia Berset , a black trans woman serving as the resident hair stylist in prison. And for much of the audience, it was also the first time they met the actress Laverne Cox, who landed the role of Sophia at the age of forty just when she was thinking she was going to quit acting altogether . Suddenly, Laverne Cox was a breakout TV star, and with that came the expectations and responsibilities of another role, leader, and advocate for trans people everywhere that it' reallys my job to continue to invite people to see trans people as human beings in a world that deeply dehumanizes us. In her new memoir called Transcendent, Cox talks about the challenges that she faced long before Netflix ever came knocking , a mother who withheld love, a father who was never around , and the brutal denigration she encountered growing up black and trans in the deep south. I feel so blessed and grateful to be who I am and to have fought , to be who I am to fought. The demons inside myself, the demons that have internalized from systems and structures and from my mother and teachers and other kids . I sometimes feel like it's a miracle . May we talk about your mother because so much of this book is centered on her and your relationship with her, how your whole life, you know, Laverne, as you were trying to be who you are , you talk about how cruel she could be to you. Can you tell me first why did you decide to build so much of this memoir around your mother ? My mother is just this key figure in my life . I was desperate for her love and approval as a child and as a young adult . And then I had to let go of that . And then I've like come to a place of deep compassion for her as I've understood with my own sort of healing journey , just how a lot of her own trauma has not been processed and has not been healed. And there's something kind of remarkable about the things that she's accomplished despite all of that . If I may, I want to be specific for people who haven't read this book . You know, there was one line that really hit me. This is, this is when you were at the Fine Arts School in Alabama and you wrote, I had always known that I couldn't come out to my mother then because I still needed a place to stay in the summertime and on breaks. And I thought , God My, I mean, Laverne, you literally felt like you had to choose suppressing the truth about yourself or being homeless for a few weeks or a month, right? Yes Well, my mother would always sort of, I guess, threaten us and say if you don't act right, I'll put you out. And when we were in third grade, an incident happened and we ended up my mother dropped us off at our I called him the sperm donor's house because he's never a father . But dropped us off at our biological father's house who we never met . And there was a woman there who we didn't know and the next day the woman takes us to the police station and we end up in an orphanage for a month . So even though your mom remembered it only as a week, but you and your twin brother remembered, no, we were there a month. Yeah, absolutely. And when my mother would say, you know, if you don't act right, I'll put you out after that, the orphanage it was it was a threat that felt quite real . And it was that I mean, yeah, that was it was that awful. I'm trying to keep myself together . Think so about it. Yeah, it's no, it's fine . I'm struck by listening to you because there has always been the way you've described it in this book, a strong inner voice in you. Like even as a child , you were bullied severely, beaten, ridiculed for acting like a girl, for talking like a girl, but you always told yourself that you would not retaliate against them, sink to their level. And where do you think that comes from this I will rise above mentality? Because you seem to have had this for so long . Well, the Ival Rise above mentality is why I call the book transcendent. When I read Walden when I was a freshman in high school, I was just sort of like transcendentalism. This is like this is what I wanted to do my whole life. I wanted to transcend how people see me because I was assign ed at birth and because I'm black and poor in the South. I want to transcend this body. I want to transcend like time and space. And I finally had a word for what I longed to do and what I felt like I was here to do. As we mentioned, you were cast in Orange as the new black when you were forty years old. And when you look back on it, you say , you're glad that opportunity came later in life for youth. Can you say more about that? Like what does it mean to you to be ready for success? Well , you know, nineteen years after I moved to New York, I turned forty and I hadn't had a breakout moment that would change my life and I was still in student loan debt and rent arrears and so I let it go. And a friend who had just got ten into Colombia sold me his GREE study material at a discount . No he happen. And so I started studying for the GRE and I started like getting graduate school applic ations . And then like I turned forty in may twenty ninth and then the orange audition happened in late August, early September of that year. In my twenties, I was I was not sec ure in myself, but in my forties , I was on the path, the journey of learning that I was worthy , not because of something I did, but because I'm a child of God, because I am born. What would you love to tell the young Laverne when she was back in Alabama in Mobile , just beginning to find her dreams as a kid? Watching Cherylie Ralph on good times and just in awe of her and then you know you would end up meeting Sherly Ralph. Sharing red carpet moments with Sheryl. The first time I met her, I told her like how I would pretend to be her moved by she was so gracious and she was just Cheryl. Cheryl is she was just in her anointed goddess nest that she just always carries oh black women are everything. There's something wonderful about black women and I think there's something wonderful about trans people , especially when we allow ourselves to be in that anointed space that is really ours to claim . I really feel that . And so I would say to Little Levern that every single impulse that you have is good and right and that you are beautiful , you are lovable, you are wanted and you deserve the very, very best in life and in the world . And don't worry , don't worry, you will be the person that you know you are , you will become the woman of your dreams and fantasies and you will exist in that anointed transcendent space that you long to I wish someone talked to me like that as well . Laverne Cox's new book is called Transcendent. Thank you so much Laverne for coming in and speaking to all of us. This was really special. My pleasure, thank you so much . 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