Abstract
'Middlesex' is a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel written by Jeffrey Eugenides and published in 2002. By 2007, 1.3 million copies of the book had been sold.
Jeffrey Eugenides is a half American, half Greek writer, born and raised in Detroit. He also wrote the best seller "Virgin Suicides", which was published nine years before Middlesex. He was therefore already considered as a famous writer by the time he published his second novel. His inspiration for "Middlesex" came from Herculine Barbi's Diary, a hermaphrodite convent girl. Deducing that she didn't relate enough to the emotions and fears of a hermaphrodite, he decided to write the story he had enjoyed reading from her diary, in his own style. Following his researches on hermaphroditism, he started writing his book.
