You Are Not I (short story)

For the film adaptation, see You Are Not I (film).
"You Are Not I"
Short story by Paul Bowles
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Publication
Published inMademoiselle
Publication dateJanuary 1948

"You Are Not I" is a short story by Paul Bowles written in 1948 and first published in the January 1948 issue of Mademoiselle magazine. It later appeared in the collection of his short fiction, The Delicate Prey and Other Stories (1950), published by Random House.[1]

The story is one Bowles's tale of "transference", in which the madwoman who narrates the story believes she has occupied the body and mind of her sane sister.[2][3]

  1. ^ Hibbard, 1993 p. 256
  2. ^ Vidal, 1979 Introduction.
  3. ^ Hibbard, 1993 p. 39: "Ethyl is telling a story (the entire story) in which she tells another story (the 'will power" reversal) in which the [sane] sister becomes the author of a story in which Ethyl is the character."