Middlesex (ISBN 0374199698) is a novel by Jeffrey Eugenides. It was published in 2002 and won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2003. Image File history File links Middlesex_novel. ... Image File history File links Middlesex_novel. ... Daniel Defoes Robinson Crusoe; title page of 1719 newspaper edition A novel (from French nouvelle, new) is an extended fictional narrative in prose. ... Jeffrey Eugenides [] (born March 8, 1960, in Detroit, Michigan) is an American novelist and short story writer of Greek and Irish origins. ... For the Cusco album, see 2002 (album). ... The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction has been awarded since 1948 for distinguished fiction by an American author, preferably dealing with American life. ... 2003 (MMIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

The narrator and protagonist, Calliope Stephanides, is an intersexed person of Greek descent. She later calls himself, Cal. Specifically, he has 5-alpha-reductase deficiency. The bulk of the novel is devoted to telling his coming-of-age story growing up in Detroit, Michigan in the late 20th century. This story, however, is intertwined with many aspects of a family saga, the era's zeitgeist and contemporary history, thus making it an arguable candidate for The Great American Novel. It has been suggested that Third person limited omniscient be merged into this article or section. ... The protagonist is the central figure of a story, and is often referred to as a storys main character. ... An intersexual is a person (or individual of any unisexual species) who is born with genitalia and/or secondary sexual characteristics of indeterminate sex, or which combine features of both sexes. ... 5-alpha-reductase deficiency (5-ARD) is a condition caused by a mutation of the 5-alpha reductase type 2 gene. ... A bildungsroman (IPA //, German: novel of education or novel of formation) is a novel which traces the spiritual, moral, psychological, or social development and growth of the main character from (usually) childhood to maturity. ... Nickname: Motor City Motto: Speramus Meliora; Resurget Cineribus (Latin for, We Hope For Better Things; It Shall Rise From the Ashes) Official website: www. ... (19th century - 20th century - 21st century - more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s As a means of recording the passage of time, the 20th century was that century which lasted from 1901–2000 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar (1900–1999 in the... The family saga is a genre of literature which chronicles the lives and doings of a family or a number of related or interconnected families over a period of time. ... Look up Zeitgeist in Wiktionary, the free dictionary (help· info) is originally a German expression that means the spirit (Geist) of the time (Zeit). It denotes the intellectual and cultural climate of an era. ... The Great American Novel is the concept of a novel that perfectly represents the spirit of life in the United States of America at the time of its publication. ...

Plot summary

The novel begins in the small Greek village of his grandparents, where brother Lefty and sister Desdemona fall in love. The two are forced to emigrate to America during the 1922 war between Greece and Turkey. Leaving behind their village, they are free to marry without risking the social stigma. They meet their cousin Lina in Detroit, Michigan and raise two children there. Nickname: Motor City Motto: Speramus Meliora; Resurget Cineribus (Latin for, We Hope For Better Things; It Shall Rise From the Ashes) Official website: www. ...

Their son, Milton, marries Lina's daughter, and thus his second cousin, Tessie. The pair also raise two children, one a boy who will eventually receive the nickname "Chapter Eleven," and is referred to as such through the entire novel. (Although the nickname is never explicitly explained in the novel, it is probably a reference to the fact that he eventually bankrupts the family business.) The second child is Calliope, in whom two recessive genes meet and the effects of inbreeding become apparent. Notice of closure stuck on the door of a computer store the day after its parent company, Granville Technology Group Ltd, declared bankruptcy (strictly, administration - see text) in the UK. Bankruptcy is a legally declared inability or impairment of ability of an individual or organization to pay their creditors. ...

Calliope discovers the truth about her gender at fourteen shortly after her first sexual experience with her female best friend, referred to in the novel as "The Obscure Object." She is taken to a clinic in New York where she undergoes a series of tests and examinations. At the end, Calliope becomes Cal, taking on a male identity and running away. Cal hitchhikes cross-country, finally arriving in San Francisco, where he becomes an attraction in a burlesque show. This page is a candidate for speedy deletion. ...

External links

• The New York Review of Books review of Middlesex
• Excerpt of Middlesex
• First chapter of Middlesex Free registration required.