One Reason to Write a Memoir
I wouldn’t suggest that one ought to write for one’s descendants. That is not a good reason to write a memoir. One ought to write for one’ self. Your descendents may or may not benefit. I certainly believe that a function of memoir is to educate/inform but one can only be educated by another when […]
Create a Salon–A Temporary Writing Group
An afternoon or evening with writers can be a stimulating experience. We have so few opportunities to meet with people with whom we share an understanding of an important subtext of our lives. (more…)
Don’t Use A Writing Prompt Unless…
You read the piece written from a writing prompt to your writing group or post it to a forum and people comment about how clever you are and how important it is to write with humor. “Make things funny,” they say. But… Have you plumbed the memory that would give your memoir depth? (more…)
4 Ways to Write About Love
Valentine’s Day offers the perfect opportunity to write about love. What are your love stories? (more…)
Three Excuses for not Writing Your Memoir Today
Most of us use a certain number of excuses for not writing when we want to avoid our memoir projects. Here are a few favorites. (more…)
The Photos You Don’t Have / How to Journal Without The Photos
As you organize your photos for your albums, you notice gaps in what you photographed. You remember events that you didn’t even photograph at all– perhaps you weren’t there or perhaps you were too busy to take photos. (more…)
Thinking About Memoir Writing
Our right thinking about memoir writing projects or our right talking about them can lead to success or failure. We can be very clever about our evasive tactics and disguise them as right thinking. Here are three examples that can pass for thoughtfulness rather than evasion. (more…)
Motivation to Complete A Memoir
All writers face the atrophy of motivation to complete a memoir that seems to come with writing a long literary work over months and months and even over a period of years. Let’s face it: writing can be hard and discouraging. The most interesting of topics (more…)
Fiction and memoir writing: When Is It not a Memoir?
It’s an interesting book, very well-written in terms of style and organization, but my nagging doubt is that it is autobiographical fiction and not memoir… (more…)