The Art of Memoir
To write a good memoir you must become the editor of your own life, imposing on an untidy sprawl of half-remembered events a narrative shape and an organizing idea. Memoir is the art of inventing the truth.
William Zinsser • On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction
“A memoir is a diorama of experience, populated only partially with the memories we carry to the desk. Part of the work of writing it is that of completing that diorama with”
— Body Work: The Radical Power of Personal Narrative by Melissa Febos
https://a.co/azPXcjI
— Body Work: The Radical Power of Personal Narrative by Melissa Febos
https://a.co/azPXcjI
At a certain point, all memory is fiction. What we retain of the past is selective—our brain typically glosses over the finer details—even the substance of it is subject to change. Our past, much like our present and future, is fluid, constantly running, and not even Memory can step in that same river twice. The memoir, however, attempts to fix... See more