Phillip Lopate's richest and most ambitious book yet - the final volume of a trilogy that began with Bachelorhood and Against Joie de Vivre - Portrait of My Body is a powerful memoir in the form of interconnected personal essays. One of America's foremost essayists, who helped focus attention on the form in his acclaimed anthology The Art of the Personal Essay, Lopate demonstrates here just how far a writer can go in the direction of honesty and risk taking.