CONSIDER WRITING A MEMOIR – FOR YOUR FAMILY, FOR YOURSELF
A friend just told me she has begun writing another memoir. She has already done one for her daughter and one each for her two grandchildren. This one is for herself. These are not books she expects to publish. They are a way to keep and pass on some of what she has experienced in her long and adventuresome life.
This friend is in her 80s and frail. She knows that her memory has holes. She’s calling her memoir Moments. Whenever something pops into her mind that she doesn’t wants to forget to include, she writes a note to herself and tucks it into the notebook where her work-in-progress is taking shape, to be inserted into the text later. When possible, she checks her facts.
Dear Reader, if you are at a stage of life where the road behind you looks longer than the road ahead, consider writing a memoir—something for the younger people in your family, perhaps, but mostly for yourself, not necessarily with the intention of being published.
Chances are that your children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews are too busy—overscheduled, distracted-- to listen to you tell stories that aren’t specifically about them. But when you’re gone or can no longer remember they may well wish they had found the needed time to listen. They may then find your memoir of great interest. It could expand their sense of who they are and where they come from. They’ll see you as someone more than just a parent or relative.
You too will benefit from undertaking such a project. You will learn much about yourself, people close to you, and about the times in which your story evolved. You’ll also enjoy the sense of having crafted something.
You will see the shape of your life more clearly, from your current perspective.
A memoir is not a diary, in which you record daily events and reflections day by day. It’s not an autobiography, in which you try to sum up your life (an exception is The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, which was written by Gertrude Stein) nor is it a journal, which need not have a structure, though it may have a theme. An artist I know writes a dream journal. It becomes a springboard for her poetry. Others may record their thought process in working out a philosophical or religious problem. The word journaling has become a verb and you may find many different definitions and descriptions of such writing.
A memoir is a story based on your experience, told from your perspective. It’s nonfiction. It has a theme and stories that support that theme. It tells what you have learned and how you and your life have changed. It has a structure and characters and a dramatic arc. It makes use of devices common in novels, and dwells on feelings and significant descriptive details. It’s built of memories, facts and imagination.
In the next two pieces to be posted on this site I’ll mention a few memoirs I’ve appreciated, and offer suggestions on how to begin yours, the memoir only you can write.
Illustration Credit: Tamara Šurbat