As a journalist myself, one starts writing from the opposite end of the spectrum (fact). Reading Flaunting your flaws certainly made me a bit uncomfortable. Anyway, a journalist friend of mine is writing a book about an atom bomb. Because he didn't think he had enough factual material (documents, journals, etc), he wrote a novel. But as he progressed, he discovered he had enough factual material and has turned it into a work of non-fiction (which in this particular case is definitely stranger than fiction). He had written two thirds of it as a novel and is now rewriting the entire work.
Methinks you're making much too big a deal out of this. Even when you say you're writing the "truth," why should I have any true reason to believe you? A writer's always looking to make a scene either more dramatic or to show off the writer in a better light--or worse. Entertain, mesmerizr the reader, pulling him/her by the neck and not letting to. All this talk of genres--mere categories, all born to be twisted out of shape by an able mind. I just read and book about William Blake's visions and how he was ignored and ridiculed in his time. Now I'm reading a bio of Pat Nixon and it's just as compelling.
It's not the subject; it's the way it's handled. Memoir? Novel? Confession? They're all essentially made-up, even (maybe especially?) when the writer swears up and down it's all gospel truth. Actually believe that? What kind of idiot you take me for? Of course, that's all through my overly-biased eyes so what do I know?
Cathy, as I see it, regardless of topic...you invite, with each post, reason for us to examine and reexamine matters of the mind, and life, that have escaped notice or failed to garner any attention at all.
Oh, we all make mistakes. Made a worse one last night--stepped on someone's foot in my tap dance class. In tap shoes. The woman has a bruise.
Lemon in water: not too controversial. You remedied by re-writing. But hey, then there's memoir! So many writers I know have had the same experience: you research your subject into the ground--in my case I sometimes took passages straight out of my journals, where I'd written down conversations right after they happened, or even as they were happening. The family somehow finds the (tiny little publisher, not very well publicized) book and claims the writer is delusional and hateful and wildly inventive. I love a quotation from Salman Rushdie, recently used by Shalom Auslander in his new memoir, Feh: "Those who do not have power over the story that dominates their lives, power to retell it, rethink it, deconstruct it, joke about it, and change it as times change, truly are powerless."
I like Feh--it's got some really funny moments--but prefer his first memoir as a memoir, namely Foreskin's Lament. Feh is philosophical, darker--like Kafka, Auslander considers Kafka's writing hilarious. Kafka used to read aloud to his friends, chortling, as the friends wept. I would have been among the weepers. There's interesting stuff about Auslander's relationship with Philip Seymour Hoffman. Definitely worth reading.
Useful lessons, for us all.
As a journalist myself, one starts writing from the opposite end of the spectrum (fact). Reading Flaunting your flaws certainly made me a bit uncomfortable. Anyway, a journalist friend of mine is writing a book about an atom bomb. Because he didn't think he had enough factual material (documents, journals, etc), he wrote a novel. But as he progressed, he discovered he had enough factual material and has turned it into a work of non-fiction (which in this particular case is definitely stranger than fiction). He had written two thirds of it as a novel and is now rewriting the entire work.
Why did this piece make you uncomfortable? Fascinating, about your friend. "Stranger than fiction" is promising indeed! (Hmm: do they need an editor?)
Methinks you're making much too big a deal out of this. Even when you say you're writing the "truth," why should I have any true reason to believe you? A writer's always looking to make a scene either more dramatic or to show off the writer in a better light--or worse. Entertain, mesmerizr the reader, pulling him/her by the neck and not letting to. All this talk of genres--mere categories, all born to be twisted out of shape by an able mind. I just read and book about William Blake's visions and how he was ignored and ridiculed in his time. Now I'm reading a bio of Pat Nixon and it's just as compelling.
It's not the subject; it's the way it's handled. Memoir? Novel? Confession? They're all essentially made-up, even (maybe especially?) when the writer swears up and down it's all gospel truth. Actually believe that? What kind of idiot you take me for? Of course, that's all through my overly-biased eyes so what do I know?
I take you for an intelligent and kind "idiot," since you ask! But do I know you In Real Life?
Cathy, as I see it, regardless of topic...you invite, with each post, reason for us to examine and reexamine matters of the mind, and life, that have escaped notice or failed to garner any attention at all.
I applaud every post.
I am so happy to get this appreciation! Yes, I am hoping my posts will inspire my readers, friends and strangers, to reexamine the familiar.
Oh, we all make mistakes. Made a worse one last night--stepped on someone's foot in my tap dance class. In tap shoes. The woman has a bruise.
Lemon in water: not too controversial. You remedied by re-writing. But hey, then there's memoir! So many writers I know have had the same experience: you research your subject into the ground--in my case I sometimes took passages straight out of my journals, where I'd written down conversations right after they happened, or even as they were happening. The family somehow finds the (tiny little publisher, not very well publicized) book and claims the writer is delusional and hateful and wildly inventive. I love a quotation from Salman Rushdie, recently used by Shalom Auslander in his new memoir, Feh: "Those who do not have power over the story that dominates their lives, power to retell it, rethink it, deconstruct it, joke about it, and change it as times change, truly are powerless."
Thanks for consoling me. But your mistake was unintentional; I was, I hope, conscious when I first wrote these things. So, intentional.
So how is Feh? I like his Substack.
I like Feh--it's got some really funny moments--but prefer his first memoir as a memoir, namely Foreskin's Lament. Feh is philosophical, darker--like Kafka, Auslander considers Kafka's writing hilarious. Kafka used to read aloud to his friends, chortling, as the friends wept. I would have been among the weepers. There's interesting stuff about Auslander's relationship with Philip Seymour Hoffman. Definitely worth reading.
Public recognition of one's errors is a huge quality, no matter what the context actually is, and I tip my hat to you for doing this.
Aw, thank you. Frankly, it was hard to write, but I had to do it!