Author Leslie Jamison on recovering from alcoholism

In her new book, The Recovering: Intoxication and its Aftermath, Leslie Jamison lays bare her own recovery from alcoholism and delves into the drinking and recovery stories of other writers and artists whose lives and work were shaped by their dependence and addiction. The book also looks at the larger history of the recovery movement, and at the complicated bearing that race and class have on our understanding of who is criminal and who is ill. Jamison teaches nonfiction at the Columbia University MFA programme, where she also leads the Marian House Project. She has written a novel, The Gin Closet, and a collection of essays, The Empathy Exams. Her work has appeared in places including The New York Times Magazine, Harper's, Oxford American, A Public Space, Virginia Quarterly Review, and The Believer. For several years she was also a columnist for the New York Times Book Review.