Raising Raffi

January 1, 2022

Cofounder of the literary magazine n + 1 and an author, editor, and translator, Gessen would seem to have a lot under control, but here he admits that he was woefully unprepared to become a father. Baby Raffi proved to be both awesome and terrifying, and Gessen was compelled to look at life in a whole new way.

Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 4, 2022
Russian American novelist Gessen (All the Sad Young Literary Men) renders the daunting frontier of new parenthood with tenderness and humility in these eloquent essays about rearing his first child. In “Home Birth,” he recounts the rush of self-doubt that came when he and his partner, writer Emily Gould, found out they were expecting: “How was I going to make sure the baby didn’t interfere with my work?” Instead, when his son Raffi was born, Gessen writes in “Zero to Two” that his new job became obsessively monitoring Raffi’s breathing and “looking up the colors of his poops online.” This seriocomic tone infuses most of the book as Gessen recounts the joys of “mundane and significant” moments like reconnecting with his roots by teaching Raffi Russian (“our own private language”), diving into the world of picture books (“Seuss... turned out to be a real piece of work”), and becoming humbled when the Covid-19 pandemic forced him and his wife to become de facto pre-K teachers at home. Together these meditations coalesce to movingly convey the beauty of ceding control, despite how messy things get. As Gessen concedes, “When your baby is born, you think you... are going to be a certain kind of parent. It’s all a fantasy.” New parents will find no shortage of laughs, cries, and solace here.

April 15, 2022
The early years of fatherhood recounted with humility. Journalist, editor, and translator Gessen, co-founder of the journal n+1, gathers essays--previously published in the New Yorker and other publications--about fathering his firstborn son, Raffi, and finding his own identity as a parent. Beginning with the process of arranging for his son's home birth, the author chronicles nervousness, anxiety, fears, and worries, some that he realizes are common to all new parents, some that seemed to beset him in particular. Parenting manuals often spout contradictory views on care, feeding, and discipline. The effect of bilingualism on language acquisition, for example, is one issue about which experts often differ. Having come to the U.S. when he was 6, Moscow-born Gessen couldn't decide whether to teach Raffi Russian: "the language of childhood, the language of love for children, the language in which my parents and grandmothers had spoken to me." Finally, he made an effort to do so, resulting in Raffi's being able to understand some Russian but not to speak it. Choosing a school was a challenge. Among a few nearby schools, demographics varied, and after touring the schools, Gessen and his family--which now included a second son--moved to the school zone they thought, or at least hoped, would be best for Raffi. Most vexing was Raffi's behavior: He was given to violent outbursts, tantrums, and aggression toward other children. Gessen and his wife tried all manner of intervention and responses, none of which worked. "My biggest flaw as a parent was inconsistency," he admits. "I wanted to be nice; I wanted to be empathetic; I wanted to be American." Often he ended up erupting in anger, afraid that "by blowing my top too often, by not controlling my emotions," he was modeling the behavior he so desperately wanted Raffi to stop. From being a "three-year-old terrorist," Raffi evolved into a "willful, sometimes violent" 4-year-old; a stubborn 5-year-old; and an "adorable, infuriating, mercurial" 6-year-old. A warm, candid parenting memoir.

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May 1, 2022
In his author's note for this advice-free collection of essays about parenting, Gessen (A Terrible Country, 2018) says that he ""wrote this book out of desperation,"" when he ""was supposed to be doing other things." Driven by a desire to understand fatherhood, parenting styles, and his own relationship to his son (he would have a second before this book's publication), Gessen felt a lack in the available ""dad literature,"" so he wrote his own. Undertaking his project with curiosity and humor (""To write about parenting when you are a father is like writing about literature when you can hardly read.""), Gessen writes about choosing a school amidst rampant gentrification in his Brooklyn neighborhood, attempting to raise toddler Raffi to be bilingual in English and Russian (Gessen's native language), and discovering the lives of the writers behind his favorite children's books. Then the pandemic arrives, and makes parenting new all over again. Gessen dissects these subjects and more without moralizing. Fellow parents will find his bracing look at modern fatherhood a sight for sore, sleep-deprived eyes.

COPYRIGHT(2022) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

May 1, 2022

Like many parents, Gessen (All the Sad Young Literary Men) found himself in survival mode for the first several years of his son Raffi's life. A writer himself, he noticed a gap in the literature about fatherhood, between the dad who can't seem to get anything right and the superdad, the perfect parent who can do it all. Gessen assumed most dads, like him, fell somewhere in the middle of the extreme-swinging pendulum. The Moscow-born, New York-based novelist here reflects on seeing the world through new eyes in the life-changing moments after his first son's arrival, including the fears and emotions that parents don't often voice; for instance, he lost sleep over frequent baby feedings but also over an irrational fear of his son's death. A journalist by trade (and founding editor of the literary magazine n+1), Gessen doesn't miss a chance to share interesting anecdotal information about the parenting of favorite children's literature authors or parenting customs around the world. At times this feels a bit disjointed, but the book is engaging and better-written than many parenting books on the market. In addition, it is a fascinating look at the triumphs and struggles faced by a first-generation Russian immigrant. VERDICT A more literary look at the topic of parenting.

Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.