On the savvy reader who can see through a memoir writers neurosis, and how that forces us to work that much harder on the page, plus additional insights from other noted essay writers: Meredith Hall, Tobias Wolff, and David James Duncan
Welcome:
“Loving Flight School. WOW! Your story about getting published. You amaze me, truly. You did all of that with a seemingly non-supportive husband and a toddler. It is funny how in the midst of chaos something so beautiful can come anyway. Makes me think deeply about how this type of thing happens a lot in life.”
This note came through the backdoor of Flight School, meaning it was emailed directly rather than posted in the comment section. I read it many times and thought about it a lot. There’s a teaching in there; I kept telling myself. Finally, I wrote a note to the author and asked if I could use it for a post! The writer graciously agreed.
The comment referred to Never, Never, Never Give In Pts. 1-8 about the push to get my first memoir published despite a mountain of obstacles.
Because this is Substack, a newsletter, and an “in the moment” teaching, what I write in these posts will not be held (by me) to the same standards as, say…a book. I’m writing “on the fly” and juggling many balls as I create these posts. For example, The Never, Never, Never Give In series is about getting published, but also a climatic moment when all the antagonistic forces rise, converge, and are either overcome or not.
I used this chart back in April, and you can read about it by clicking here. I’m using it again now to reiterate the inner, personal and the extra-personal conflicts, all of which happen simultaneously.
Wrap your brain around that for a second. That’s pretty hard, right? Harder is returning to the lived experience and realizing what you were dealing with at the time. It wasn’t just a challenge you lived through; it was a challenge on three dimensions and in nine different categories of conflict. Come on. That’s intense. But I digress…
So…here I am writing Never, Never, Never Give In, juggling all those antagonistic forces (or trying) in the storytelling as a way to show you how to do the same in your writing and along comes this comment in the form of that “feedback sandwich” we’ve heard about; positive going in and coming out with a zinger of insight in the middle.
You did all of that with a seemingly non-supportive husband and a toddler…
FYI: That seemingly is a HUGE reveal. MASSIVE. VITAL. Seemingly is what had me write this post.
Because we call our writing “memoir,” we are also saying “believe me,” but the reader is savvy enough to know that truth is subjective, conditional, and interpretive. They know ten people can watch the same car wreck and describe it differently. They know that their memory of the past directly (often painfully) contradicts the memory of their mother, father, sister, brother, and so on. And they know to be alert about “truth.” They aren’t going to believe you because you say, “this is a memoir.” You have to work hard for their trust. This is more true right now. I mean, come on, have you ever felt more jerked around than in 2020-2022? Distrustful? Confused? Cynical? It seems that someone is trying to screw with us at every turn—neighbors, teachers, mentors, trusted healers, members of our own family, and indeed the media and our leaders. We are all on high alert right now. We are all on edge.
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