Tell It Slant, Second Edition

to tell the truth, yes, but to become more than a mere transcriber of life’s factual experiences.

“Good memoirs are a careful act of construction. We like to think that an interesting life will simply fall into place on the page. It won’t. … Memoir writers must manufacture a text, imposing narrative order on a jumble of half-remembered events.”

“the five Rs” of creative nonfiction: Real Life, Reflection, Research, Reading, and ’Riting.

Memory begins to qualify the imagination, to give it another formation, one that is peculiar to the self. … If I were to remember other things, I should be someone else. —N. SCOTT MOMADAY

By paying attention to the sensory gateways of the body, you also begin to write in a way that naturally embodies experience, making it tactile for the reader.

Memory itself could be called its own bit of creative nonfiction. We continually—often unconsciously—renovate our memories, shaping them into stories that bring coherence to chaos.

Memory begins to qualify the imagination, to give it another formation, one that is peculiar to the self. … If I were to remember other things, I should be someone else. —N. SCOTT MOMADAY

What are the smells you remember that even in memory make you stop a moment and breathe deeply, or that make your heart beat more vigorously, your palms ache for what’s been lost? Write these down. Write as quickly as you can, seeing how one smell leads to another. What kinds of images, memories, or stories might arise from this sensory trigger?

In nonfiction, if we place a premium on fact, then this man’s diary would be the ultimate masterpiece. But in literature and art, we applaud style, meaning, and effect over the bare facts.