In 2000, my then fiancé and I were visiting my parents, and my dad said, "Oh, have you seen this guy?" And he turned on Dress to Kill. Besides loving the comedy routine, I remember being blown away that my dad—a very conservative man—was kind of fine watching a transvestite. I had to wonder whether being funny somehow excused what would otherwise bother my father, or if maybe there were things (in Dad's philosophy) that were okay for transvestites? Or maybe Dad just thought it was part of the act?
We've never talked about it, so I still don't know.
But at that point I fell in love with Eddie Izzard's comedy. My husband and I have since seen him live a number of times for Sexie, Stripped, some new material he was just trying out, and Force Majeure. We pretty much try to see him whenever he's in the area (first when we lived in Boston, now out in San Francisco).
Look, I grew up with British comedy, so that's probably a large part of my enjoyment of Izzard's work. He speaks repeatedly in Believe Me about his being influenced by Monty Python, and I grew up watching Monty Python (and Fawlty Towers, Are You Being Served? 'Allo 'Allo!, Keeping Up Appearances, some weird show called Mulberry that I sometimes think I dreamed up . . . the list goes on). So I think Eddie and I have some similar tastes, you know, we jibe. So that's cool.
All this to give you a sense of why I wanted to read this book.
It's definitely Eddie Izzard writing. Even with a co-writer credited, this is his voice, and there didn't seem to be much buffing of it. In fact, there were several places where I thought it needed another editing and proofreading pass. But that's fine, no big deal, and they'll probably fix it in the paperback.
You get the definite sense that Izzard struggles a bit with opening himself up. But at the same time, he seems fairly self-aware and introspective. He goes through the major events of his life (starting with his mother's death when he was six) and discusses how he felt then and what he thinks about it now. The gist of the book is about how persistence pays off, or at least it did for him. How being stubborn and determined is basically how he got where he is today. And he talks about the circumstances that shaped him, and of course about coming out and how he dealt with that and continues to deal with various reactions from people.
The book actually made for a very good conversation with my 9-year-old daughter. She saw the cover and asked, "Is that a boy or a girl?" Which gave me the perfect opportunity to explain gender fluidity. We talked about all the different ways people might feel about their bodies, like maybe they were meant to be a different gender and might want to change their bodies or at least dress differently. I think it was a productive discussion.
Overall, I enjoyed the book, though it made me kind of sad in thinking about my own attempts to succeed. Which I think is the opposite reaction Izzard might've wanted, but . . . Well, I won't go into it. Long story short, it's a nice read, and I look forward to the next time he's in town.
Showing posts with label memoirs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label memoirs. Show all posts
1.09.2018
9.28.2015
Books: You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost) by Felicia Day
Picked this one up prior to traveling to London and it was a nice, quick and easy read for the plane.
I am not, for the record, any particular fan of Ms. Day, though I've seen many of the shows she's been in (I'm a fan of Joss Whedon, so . . .) Why, then, did I decide to read her memoir? Because it sounded interesting. And as I read, I realized we have a lot of personality traits in common.
Anyway. It's a great little book that doesn't require Felicia Day fandom to enjoy or relate, though whether you find her life and experiences interesting may be predicated on how much you like . . . geekdom? Day doesn't say anything specific about time on the Buffy set or other such things, instead focusing on her own work with The Guild and Geek and Sundry. We do get a lot about commercials and auditions, though, and acting classes, etc. And a bit about conventions, of course. (I was the guest at conventions when I was at UT, back when fan fiction had to be published in zines rather than just slapped onto the Internet. I was a fanfic author of some renown at the time—well, and my Sherlock fic from a few years back is still considered the gold standard—and those conventions were so fun. Maybe I'll get to do it again some day. Thanks, Felicia, for giving me permission to own that I got my start writing fanfic before moving on to more "serious" work.)
Other topics covered include mental illness and Gamergate. On the whole, it's a somewhat spotty story, but a good one. Worth the little bit of time it takes to read.
I am not, for the record, any particular fan of Ms. Day, though I've seen many of the shows she's been in (I'm a fan of Joss Whedon, so . . .) Why, then, did I decide to read her memoir? Because it sounded interesting. And as I read, I realized we have a lot of personality traits in common.
- Weird upbringing in the American South? Check. (Though mine was distinctly different from hers, I was equally isolated and had difficulty making friends.)
- Crush on Commander Riker? Check. Named my favorite teddy bear William. Though later MacGyver became my man.
- Creating elaborate worlds that combined favorite book and TV/film characters? Check. Mine had Han Solo and Indiana Jones as identical cousins, Patty Duke style, and for some reason they all spent a lot of time on the Enterprise. Also time traveling into the antebellum South, cuz I love me some houses with big columns.
- Astrology? Check. I still read charts for friends.
- UT Austin? Check. In fact, it sounds as if we attended at about the same time.
- Obsessive/addictive nature? Check. For me it was TV shows and movies rather than video games, but yeah. You should see my scrapbooks.
- Having a friendly support group hold you accountable and get you to start writing? Check.
- A people-pleasing, perfectionist nature? Check. I didn't necessarily need kids my age to like me, but boy howdy did I want my teachers to love me. All my self-worth was caught up in that, and I still struggle with it.
- Wanting to erase yourself from the world (digital or otherwise)? Check. I went through that a few years back, deleting accounts left and right, and I'm starting to feel that way again now.
Anyway. It's a great little book that doesn't require Felicia Day fandom to enjoy or relate, though whether you find her life and experiences interesting may be predicated on how much you like . . . geekdom? Day doesn't say anything specific about time on the Buffy set or other such things, instead focusing on her own work with The Guild and Geek and Sundry. We do get a lot about commercials and auditions, though, and acting classes, etc. And a bit about conventions, of course. (I was the guest at conventions when I was at UT, back when fan fiction had to be published in zines rather than just slapped onto the Internet. I was a fanfic author of some renown at the time—well, and my Sherlock fic from a few years back is still considered the gold standard—and those conventions were so fun. Maybe I'll get to do it again some day. Thanks, Felicia, for giving me permission to own that I got my start writing fanfic before moving on to more "serious" work.)
Other topics covered include mental illness and Gamergate. On the whole, it's a somewhat spotty story, but a good one. Worth the little bit of time it takes to read.
12.20.2013
Books: The Devil, the Lovers, & Me: My Life in Tarot by Kimberlee Auerbach
There is no way that's an actual reading, I thought upon seeing the spread depicted next to the book's Table of Contents. For one thing, it's all Major Arcana, and while I suppose one could do a reading with only the Major Arcana, it's not typical so far as I know. And there's only one reversed card. Either you read with reverses or you don't, but if you do, then (in my experience) there's never only one reversed card (unless you're only reading, say, a three-card spread). But again, I allow that maybe, just maybe, one card in the deck got flipped around. If so, surely it does mean something?
Whatever. Auerbach's book isn't about Tarot anyway, not really. It's a memoir with the clever gimmick of using a different [Major Arcana] Tarot card for each chapter. In this way, Auerbach traces the stories—and lessons—of her life.
The setup is thus: Auerbach goes to see a Tarot reader because she wants answers. Why else would one go? But a lot of people have this idea that Tarot will foretell the future, and while it can, it's really better made for helping a person make sense of things. This is because life is constantly changing. Using Tarot to tell the future only works in that single moment—the "answer" the cards give is predicated on nothing changing. And maybe you don't like change, and you live your days pretty much the same. If so, you probably don't need a pack of cards to tell you the outcome. But if you do, you know, have a life, well, the cards can only say what is likely to happen assuming you continue to live more or less the way you have done.
Not that I intended to lecture or anything.
Anyway, the Tarot reader helps Auerbach make sense of her life, past and present, so that she can face the future with a sort of sense of renewal. Fresh start and all that. The result is a really long Tarot reading in which Auerbach pretty much tells the reader (Tarot and book) her entire life story.
The book is engaging in tone, though I found some of the frame story exchanges between Auerbach and the Tarot reader too pat. I did like the way the cards and placements in the spreads were explained. But again, they're not the point of the book. The point is for Auerbach to tell her anecdotal history in handy chunks. And the stories of her life experiences are interesting; I found I could relate to a lot of them myself (we're from the same generation, I think, though she was a few years ahead of me based on her references—but I loved There's a Monster at the End of This Book too, and at one point did have a purple Le Clic camera).
Of course, I was not a child model (didn't do that until college), nor did I go to artsy schools.
In any case this was a quick and enjoyable read. Not everybody's life is interesting enough for a book, but Auerbach's certainly is. While most of the stories are fixated on boyfriends, and on Auerbach's insecurities and jealousies, she also breaks open her family's emotional dysfunction. Not for mere entertainment value. While it is entertaining, these anecdotes are also enlightening, asking readers to find the places in their own lives where such problems may lie. We're lucky Auerbach is willing to share; not everyone would be so brave and forthcoming. And if we can follow her path, we might be able to have the World too.
Whatever. Auerbach's book isn't about Tarot anyway, not really. It's a memoir with the clever gimmick of using a different [Major Arcana] Tarot card for each chapter. In this way, Auerbach traces the stories—and lessons—of her life.
The setup is thus: Auerbach goes to see a Tarot reader because she wants answers. Why else would one go? But a lot of people have this idea that Tarot will foretell the future, and while it can, it's really better made for helping a person make sense of things. This is because life is constantly changing. Using Tarot to tell the future only works in that single moment—the "answer" the cards give is predicated on nothing changing. And maybe you don't like change, and you live your days pretty much the same. If so, you probably don't need a pack of cards to tell you the outcome. But if you do, you know, have a life, well, the cards can only say what is likely to happen assuming you continue to live more or less the way you have done.
Not that I intended to lecture or anything.
Anyway, the Tarot reader helps Auerbach make sense of her life, past and present, so that she can face the future with a sort of sense of renewal. Fresh start and all that. The result is a really long Tarot reading in which Auerbach pretty much tells the reader (Tarot and book) her entire life story.
The book is engaging in tone, though I found some of the frame story exchanges between Auerbach and the Tarot reader too pat. I did like the way the cards and placements in the spreads were explained. But again, they're not the point of the book. The point is for Auerbach to tell her anecdotal history in handy chunks. And the stories of her life experiences are interesting; I found I could relate to a lot of them myself (we're from the same generation, I think, though she was a few years ahead of me based on her references—but I loved There's a Monster at the End of This Book too, and at one point did have a purple Le Clic camera).
Of course, I was not a child model (didn't do that until college), nor did I go to artsy schools.
In any case this was a quick and enjoyable read. Not everybody's life is interesting enough for a book, but Auerbach's certainly is. While most of the stories are fixated on boyfriends, and on Auerbach's insecurities and jealousies, she also breaks open her family's emotional dysfunction. Not for mere entertainment value. While it is entertaining, these anecdotes are also enlightening, asking readers to find the places in their own lives where such problems may lie. We're lucky Auerbach is willing to share; not everyone would be so brave and forthcoming. And if we can follow her path, we might be able to have the World too.
2.28.2011
Book Review: Disaster Preparedness
Heather Havrilesky
Riverhead Books, 2010
240 pages
hard cover
_____________________________________________________
I picked this one up from the library because one of the myriad of magazines I receive each month did a blurb recommending it. And it was a cute, sweet read, a quick read, something I could take in bite-sized chunks between the kids' naps and such. Nothing I couldn't put down, which sometimes is better because otherwise you let the television babysit a bit too much.
Havrilesky does a nice job of capturing a particular time, growing up in the 70s and 80s, though by my estimation she has about five years on me. Still, my experiences were similar, even though my parents aren't divorced and I don't have siblings--which is a credit to the writer, that I could still relate to what she had to say despite differing circumstances. Maybe it's something about the parents of our generation, or maybe it's that we grew up during the tail end of the Cold War and had to live through the drills of hunkering under our desks as if that would ever do anything to save us if the bombs fell. Maybe it's because I, too, had a day when it was made clear to me that my clothes did not come from a "good" store (weren't clothes just clothes?) and learned then to begin longing for and aspiring to something better. Like her, I had a moment of wondering whether the people at church were all wrong. And like Haverilesky, I can look back and simultaneously mourn my lost innocence and kick a little dirt at it. We all use our histories to our own ends, after all, and sometimes we can extend them for others' use, which is more or less what Havrilesky does. Whether the reader can find anything to use will probably be a more personal issue; the book wouldn't work for a different generation, perhaps, or maybe it breaks along gender lines. I don't know.
What it comes down to is that I can recommend it in general, but at the same time I understand that this book won't be for everybody. Chalk it up to "worth a shot."
Riverhead Books, 2010
240 pages
hard cover
_____________________________________________________
I picked this one up from the library because one of the myriad of magazines I receive each month did a blurb recommending it. And it was a cute, sweet read, a quick read, something I could take in bite-sized chunks between the kids' naps and such. Nothing I couldn't put down, which sometimes is better because otherwise you let the television babysit a bit too much.
Havrilesky does a nice job of capturing a particular time, growing up in the 70s and 80s, though by my estimation she has about five years on me. Still, my experiences were similar, even though my parents aren't divorced and I don't have siblings--which is a credit to the writer, that I could still relate to what she had to say despite differing circumstances. Maybe it's something about the parents of our generation, or maybe it's that we grew up during the tail end of the Cold War and had to live through the drills of hunkering under our desks as if that would ever do anything to save us if the bombs fell. Maybe it's because I, too, had a day when it was made clear to me that my clothes did not come from a "good" store (weren't clothes just clothes?) and learned then to begin longing for and aspiring to something better. Like her, I had a moment of wondering whether the people at church were all wrong. And like Haverilesky, I can look back and simultaneously mourn my lost innocence and kick a little dirt at it. We all use our histories to our own ends, after all, and sometimes we can extend them for others' use, which is more or less what Havrilesky does. Whether the reader can find anything to use will probably be a more personal issue; the book wouldn't work for a different generation, perhaps, or maybe it breaks along gender lines. I don't know.
What it comes down to is that I can recommend it in general, but at the same time I understand that this book won't be for everybody. Chalk it up to "worth a shot."
7.19.2009
Book Review: Annie's Ghosts
Steve Luxenberg
Hyperion, 2009
402 pages
hardcover
_____________________________________________________
In Annie's Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret, Steve Luxenberg delves into the divide between the knowable and the unknowable--that is, the space between what can be discovered by dogged detective work, and what can only be guessed at because the answers to some questions die along with the people who know those answers.
The situation is in itself a compelling mystery, both to the author whose story it is, and to the reader. Luxenberg's mother Beth had always made it distinctively clear that she was an only child. In fact, it was something she seemed proud of, given how often she would bring it up. And no one in the family thought much about it until they discovered it wasn't true.
What Luxenberg would eventually discover is that his mother had had a younger sister named Annie. An aging Beth had said as much to one of her doctors, though she'd said the sister was sent away at age two. Picking up this thread, Luxenberg would go on to find out after his mother's death that his unknown aunt was actually sent away at age 21 . . . And so the detective work would begin. How had his mother managed to hide an entire childhood spent with a younger sister? And why hide it at all? Meanwhile, why had Annie been sent away to a mental institution?
In Annie's Ghosts, Luxenberg details the slog through old records and red tape that was required to get to some of the answers he desired. That might sound dull, but Luxenberg is a good writer and spins everything into a mix of journalistic integrity and personal human interest. The result is a fascinating read.
Below I have an article by Luxenberg regarding that mix of truth and fiction, which I hope you'll enjoy. (Used with permission of FSB Associates.)
Memoirs, Movies and Those (Mostly) True Stories
A Writer's Take on Reality's Rough Edges
By Steve Luxenberg,
Author of Annie's Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret
Why do they do it?
Why do so many film makers put "based on a true story" or some variation as one of their opening frames, when they have freely altered the truth of the story?
Because it works. Because those words retain their mesmerizing power, even though they are misused or stretched at times to the point where there's little relationship between the story being told and the facts that gave rise to them. Truth-twisting in film has become so accepted that reviewers rarely comment on it or point out the discrepancies between fact and fiction, between information and invention.
As a long-time journalist and a first-time author, I'm probably more fascinated than most people at the transformation of a nonfiction work from book to screen. In researching and writing about a family secret that took me back to the beginning of the 20th century, I chased down many leads to ambiguous and not entirely satisfying conclusions. I joked with friends that I envied the novelist's license to invent what could not be learned or verified.
I'm not suggesting that there's a grand deception here. It's news to no one that movies change certain facts, sometimes for legal and privacy reasons. But film makers increasingly want to have it both ways. What began as a safeguard ("some facts have been changed to protect . . . ") has turned into a genre. Why not just come out and say it? "Some facts have been changed to protect the innocent, streamline the plot and increase dramatic tension. But the story is still (mostly) true."
Instead, the trend line is moving in the opposite direction. Recent case in point: The Changeling, starring Angelina Jolie as the mother fighting a corrupt Los Angeles police department that had declared a stranger to be her abducted nine-year-old son, begins with the words "a true story" appearing on a black screen, holding for a few seconds, and then fade out.
Not "based on" or "inspired by." Just that flat, unambiguous statement: "a true story." Then, in the fine print at the end the closing credits, the film makers fess up. "While this picture is based upon a true story," we're told, "some of the characters have been composited or invented, and a number of incidents fictionalized." In other words, (which I liked and admired for its storytelling as well as its artful re-creation of the 1920s) improved on the remarkable tale of Christine Collins and her young son Walter. The true story wasn't quite good enough.
Moviegoers seem to accept this hybrid genre, and the industry celebrates it (Oscars, etc.). Is it any wonder that it has crept into the world of nonfiction books, where memoir writers have claimed a license to "fill in the gaps" (based on truth and memory, of course)? Or that universities now offer courses in "creative nonfiction"?
Truman Capote gave us the "nonfiction novel," stealing a page from the film world. Tom Wolfe chose to take his new journalism into novels, which solved that problem. James Frey obviously crossed the line, however, in embellishing and inventing some of his 2003 memoir, A Million Little Pieces about his drug use and brushes with law. A screenplay version of Frey's work could have said "a true story," and no one would have batted an eye.
Subsequent editions of Frey's memoir have carried an apology from the author that is a model of muddle. "I didn't initially think of what I was writing as nonfiction or fiction, memoir or autobiography," he wrote. "I believe, and I understand others strongly disagree, that memoir allows the writer to work from memory instead of from a strict journalistic or historical standard. It is about impression and feeling, about individual recollection. This memoir is a combination of facts about my life and certain embellishments. It is a subjective truth, altered by the mind of a recovering drug addict and alcoholic. Ultimately, it's a story, and one that I could not have written without having lived the life I've lived."
Frey's right on one score: Others disagree, and there's a lively and continuing debate in the writing community about these issues. On a Facebook discussion the other day, for example, the question came up: How far should memoir writers go in reconstructing scenes and dialogue?
I draw a harder line than most. I favor the rough edges of memory over neat and pretty reconstructions. (More interesting, usually.) Invention? As I wrote in the Facebook discussion, that's why we have novels.
Readers, I think, are smart. They know that most writers don't have notes or documents to back up dialogue from long ago. So what's the problem? In a word: Credibility. As a writer, I want readers to grant me some license to tell my story. But if I present lengthy dialogue as fact, I risk losing their trust -- and their interest. Bad deal for me.
There's a scene in my new book, Annie's Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret, that illustrates the difficulty of reconstructing past events. I'm at a restaurant outside Detroit, interviewing a cousin about the secret that stands at the center of the book. The secret was my mother's. Throughout her life, my mom had hidden the existence of a disabled sister. I was trying to find out why. My search had led to my cousin, someone I had never known.
In the early 1950s, I learned, my cousin and my mother had argued about the secret, leading to a life-long rift between the two women. Just as my cousin is recounting a climatic moment in their dispute, we're interrupted by the waitress's offer of coffee. After the waitress leaves, my cousin resumes her account -- and offers a different (and more dramatic) version of the key moment she had described only seconds before.
I had no doubt about the crux of my cousin's story. My mother had, after all, kept the secret. But if I wanted an "accurate" version of their conversation, I was out of luck. My cousin was giving me the version that reflected years of thinking about that moment, that reflected her feelings as much as her memory.
"The nuances lie beyond my reach," I wrote in the book. "Fifty years later, this is the best my cousin can do."
I saw no reason to choose between the two versions. I would present both, and use the scene to point out the intricate patterns of trouble imposed by time and memory. That would be better than presenting a reconstruction of their argument.
That would be something closer to true.
©2009 Steve Luxenberg, author of Annie's Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret
Author Bio
Steve Luxenberg has been a senior editor with the Washington Post for twenty-two years, overseeing reporting that has won numerous awards, including two Pulitzer Prizes for explanatory journalism. He lives in Baltimore, Maryland.
For more information please visit www.steveluxenberg.com
Hyperion, 2009
402 pages
hardcover
_____________________________________________________
In Annie's Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret, Steve Luxenberg delves into the divide between the knowable and the unknowable--that is, the space between what can be discovered by dogged detective work, and what can only be guessed at because the answers to some questions die along with the people who know those answers.
The situation is in itself a compelling mystery, both to the author whose story it is, and to the reader. Luxenberg's mother Beth had always made it distinctively clear that she was an only child. In fact, it was something she seemed proud of, given how often she would bring it up. And no one in the family thought much about it until they discovered it wasn't true.
What Luxenberg would eventually discover is that his mother had had a younger sister named Annie. An aging Beth had said as much to one of her doctors, though she'd said the sister was sent away at age two. Picking up this thread, Luxenberg would go on to find out after his mother's death that his unknown aunt was actually sent away at age 21 . . . And so the detective work would begin. How had his mother managed to hide an entire childhood spent with a younger sister? And why hide it at all? Meanwhile, why had Annie been sent away to a mental institution?
In Annie's Ghosts, Luxenberg details the slog through old records and red tape that was required to get to some of the answers he desired. That might sound dull, but Luxenberg is a good writer and spins everything into a mix of journalistic integrity and personal human interest. The result is a fascinating read.
Below I have an article by Luxenberg regarding that mix of truth and fiction, which I hope you'll enjoy. (Used with permission of FSB Associates.)
A Writer's Take on Reality's Rough Edges
By Steve Luxenberg,
Author of Annie's Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret
Why do they do it?
Why do so many film makers put "based on a true story" or some variation as one of their opening frames, when they have freely altered the truth of the story?
Because it works. Because those words retain their mesmerizing power, even though they are misused or stretched at times to the point where there's little relationship between the story being told and the facts that gave rise to them. Truth-twisting in film has become so accepted that reviewers rarely comment on it or point out the discrepancies between fact and fiction, between information and invention.
As a long-time journalist and a first-time author, I'm probably more fascinated than most people at the transformation of a nonfiction work from book to screen. In researching and writing about a family secret that took me back to the beginning of the 20th century, I chased down many leads to ambiguous and not entirely satisfying conclusions. I joked with friends that I envied the novelist's license to invent what could not be learned or verified.
I'm not suggesting that there's a grand deception here. It's news to no one that movies change certain facts, sometimes for legal and privacy reasons. But film makers increasingly want to have it both ways. What began as a safeguard ("some facts have been changed to protect . . . ") has turned into a genre. Why not just come out and say it? "Some facts have been changed to protect the innocent, streamline the plot and increase dramatic tension. But the story is still (mostly) true."
Instead, the trend line is moving in the opposite direction. Recent case in point: The Changeling, starring Angelina Jolie as the mother fighting a corrupt Los Angeles police department that had declared a stranger to be her abducted nine-year-old son, begins with the words "a true story" appearing on a black screen, holding for a few seconds, and then fade out.
Not "based on" or "inspired by." Just that flat, unambiguous statement: "a true story." Then, in the fine print at the end the closing credits, the film makers fess up. "While this picture is based upon a true story," we're told, "some of the characters have been composited or invented, and a number of incidents fictionalized." In other words, (which I liked and admired for its storytelling as well as its artful re-creation of the 1920s) improved on the remarkable tale of Christine Collins and her young son Walter. The true story wasn't quite good enough.
Moviegoers seem to accept this hybrid genre, and the industry celebrates it (Oscars, etc.). Is it any wonder that it has crept into the world of nonfiction books, where memoir writers have claimed a license to "fill in the gaps" (based on truth and memory, of course)? Or that universities now offer courses in "creative nonfiction"?
Truman Capote gave us the "nonfiction novel," stealing a page from the film world. Tom Wolfe chose to take his new journalism into novels, which solved that problem. James Frey obviously crossed the line, however, in embellishing and inventing some of his 2003 memoir, A Million Little Pieces about his drug use and brushes with law. A screenplay version of Frey's work could have said "a true story," and no one would have batted an eye.
Subsequent editions of Frey's memoir have carried an apology from the author that is a model of muddle. "I didn't initially think of what I was writing as nonfiction or fiction, memoir or autobiography," he wrote. "I believe, and I understand others strongly disagree, that memoir allows the writer to work from memory instead of from a strict journalistic or historical standard. It is about impression and feeling, about individual recollection. This memoir is a combination of facts about my life and certain embellishments. It is a subjective truth, altered by the mind of a recovering drug addict and alcoholic. Ultimately, it's a story, and one that I could not have written without having lived the life I've lived."
Frey's right on one score: Others disagree, and there's a lively and continuing debate in the writing community about these issues. On a Facebook discussion the other day, for example, the question came up: How far should memoir writers go in reconstructing scenes and dialogue?
I draw a harder line than most. I favor the rough edges of memory over neat and pretty reconstructions. (More interesting, usually.) Invention? As I wrote in the Facebook discussion, that's why we have novels.
Readers, I think, are smart. They know that most writers don't have notes or documents to back up dialogue from long ago. So what's the problem? In a word: Credibility. As a writer, I want readers to grant me some license to tell my story. But if I present lengthy dialogue as fact, I risk losing their trust -- and their interest. Bad deal for me.
There's a scene in my new book, Annie's Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret, that illustrates the difficulty of reconstructing past events. I'm at a restaurant outside Detroit, interviewing a cousin about the secret that stands at the center of the book. The secret was my mother's. Throughout her life, my mom had hidden the existence of a disabled sister. I was trying to find out why. My search had led to my cousin, someone I had never known.
In the early 1950s, I learned, my cousin and my mother had argued about the secret, leading to a life-long rift between the two women. Just as my cousin is recounting a climatic moment in their dispute, we're interrupted by the waitress's offer of coffee. After the waitress leaves, my cousin resumes her account -- and offers a different (and more dramatic) version of the key moment she had described only seconds before.
I had no doubt about the crux of my cousin's story. My mother had, after all, kept the secret. But if I wanted an "accurate" version of their conversation, I was out of luck. My cousin was giving me the version that reflected years of thinking about that moment, that reflected her feelings as much as her memory.
"The nuances lie beyond my reach," I wrote in the book. "Fifty years later, this is the best my cousin can do."
I saw no reason to choose between the two versions. I would present both, and use the scene to point out the intricate patterns of trouble imposed by time and memory. That would be better than presenting a reconstruction of their argument.
That would be something closer to true.
©2009 Steve Luxenberg, author of Annie's Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret
Author Bio
Steve Luxenberg has been a senior editor with the Washington Post for twenty-two years, overseeing reporting that has won numerous awards, including two Pulitzer Prizes for explanatory journalism. He lives in Baltimore, Maryland.
For more information please visit www.steveluxenberg.com
3.18.2009
Book Review: The Blue Cotton Gown: A Midwife's Memoir
Patricia Harman
Beacon Press, 2008
290 pages
hardcover
_____________________________________________________
Perhaps not the best thing for a pregnant woman to read, although the stories are, for the most part, heartwarming--it's just that some are sad, too, and with all my hormones already in an uproar, this book moved me to tears two or three times.
Still and all, there's nothing graphic in this book, nothing to scare off the faint of heart when it comes to hospital stories and such. The author, a midwife, no longer delivers babies, so there were only a couple of mild flashbacks to deal with in that respect. Mostly Harman weaves a lovely narrative of a little more than a year's time spent at the women's clinic she runs with her OB/GYN husband. She focuses on a handful of patients who make repeat appearances, weaving in her own home life at that time, as well as some of the financial woes of running a business. The result is a full picture, well worth viewing.
Harman has a knack for descriptive writing; one easily sees what she imparts. (I only wish I could see some of her photographs; she takes pictures as a hobby.) The book is a quick read, too; I finished it in less than a week, which is no small feat when you've got a toddler and an infant at home and a bazillion things to do besides. Part of the quickness of the read, though, might've been that the stories were engaging enough that I didn't necessarily want to set the book down for very long. I actively looked for snatches of time in which to read it.
I can't say I love the way Harman wraps up the book; the moment she chose seems "off" somehow, though I couldn't tell you what would've worked better. Maybe it was simply that I felt she'd taken an incident and blown it up into something bigger--something that works to her advantage a few times in the narrative, but at the end became slightly too bloated. She tried to make the moment weightier than seemed fair to do, though maybe it was that weighty to her--but it was the one place where her writing failed to get across to me.
Overall, though, a fine read.
Beacon Press, 2008
290 pages
hardcover
_____________________________________________________
Perhaps not the best thing for a pregnant woman to read, although the stories are, for the most part, heartwarming--it's just that some are sad, too, and with all my hormones already in an uproar, this book moved me to tears two or three times.
Still and all, there's nothing graphic in this book, nothing to scare off the faint of heart when it comes to hospital stories and such. The author, a midwife, no longer delivers babies, so there were only a couple of mild flashbacks to deal with in that respect. Mostly Harman weaves a lovely narrative of a little more than a year's time spent at the women's clinic she runs with her OB/GYN husband. She focuses on a handful of patients who make repeat appearances, weaving in her own home life at that time, as well as some of the financial woes of running a business. The result is a full picture, well worth viewing.
Harman has a knack for descriptive writing; one easily sees what she imparts. (I only wish I could see some of her photographs; she takes pictures as a hobby.) The book is a quick read, too; I finished it in less than a week, which is no small feat when you've got a toddler and an infant at home and a bazillion things to do besides. Part of the quickness of the read, though, might've been that the stories were engaging enough that I didn't necessarily want to set the book down for very long. I actively looked for snatches of time in which to read it.
I can't say I love the way Harman wraps up the book; the moment she chose seems "off" somehow, though I couldn't tell you what would've worked better. Maybe it was simply that I felt she'd taken an incident and blown it up into something bigger--something that works to her advantage a few times in the narrative, but at the end became slightly too bloated. She tried to make the moment weightier than seemed fair to do, though maybe it was that weighty to her--but it was the one place where her writing failed to get across to me.
Overall, though, a fine read.
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