Although some may say that Hunger is ultimately an account of the traumatic experience Gay had as a young girl that caused her to build her body into a place where she could “hide in plain sight… feeding a hunger that could never be satisfied” (61), Gay’s comments throughout the memoir bring to light a plethora of different issues regarding living in a fat body and being destroyed by several different kinds of trauma. This is a book about disappearing and being lost and wanting so very much and… learning, however slowly, to allow myself to be seen and understood” (5). She goes on to explain that “this is not a story about triumph…. This is a memoir of (my) body because, more often than not, stories of bodies like mine are ignored or dismissed or derided” (5).
When prepping her reader for the memoir that would come after the first few chapters, Gay specifically observes “This is my truth. In Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body, Roxane Gay dissects her trauma, as well as her personal battles with the social constructs of beauty, gender, fashion, femininity, and disability regarding her own body. In her free time, she likes to read memoirs and cook things from scratch! Cydney plans to graduate with her Master’s and teach for a while before pursuing a Ph.D. Cydney Price is a second year graduate student at Georgia Southern University working toward her Master’s degree in English Literature.