Top Menu

Archive | Setting in a memoir is crucial.

Setting in a memoir is crucial.

Absolutely!

A story will be supported an enhanced by the development of the setting in a memoir.

The term “setting” is generally understood to refer to where your memoir takes place. This is a city or a rural neighborhood, a state or province, a country. Setting includes a house and a room and a street. If your pen were a movie camera, the setting would be what your camera would eventually project on the screen.

In this sense, setting is a physical and tangible element. Even when it no longer exists, your obligation as a memoirist is to reproduce it in your pages as if it were still there. The reader feels as if s/he were in the midst of the world that once was.

But, there’s more…

Setting in a memoir can also refer to a whole series of abstract factors that are equally crucial to understanding—interpreting—your story:

  • socio-economic status of your family, especially in relation to the community,
  • the time frame (the era),
  • religion or religious group,
  • ethnic group, again in relation to the community,
  • education of the characters—or lack therof,
  • history of the town, state, country.

Your challenge

The author frequently assumes either the universality of his/her experience or the lack of interest readers will have in this setting. Consequently, the author omits including the abstract setting in much detail. She might write, “We were Congregationalists,” but not demonstrate what that meant in her life—whether a lot or little. Your experience is not generally understood without details

To understand a character and  memoir one has to understand the setting—in all its complexity.

In conclusion

Nurture the setting of your memoir. Setting in a memoir is crucial.

develop the setting

Develop the Setting: the Somewhere of Your Story

Writers seem to grasp that every memoir needs well-developed characters and actions, but the same is always not true when they are asked to develop the setting of their memoir.

Develop the Setting

The term “setting” is generally understood to refer to the physical “where” in which your memoir takes place. This can be a city or a rural neighborhood, a state or province, a country. This sense of setting includes a house and a room and a street. If your pen were a movie camera, the setting would be what your camera would eventually project onto the screen.

In this first sense, setting is a physical and tangible element. Even when the physical setting no longer exists, your obligation as a memoirist is to reproduce it in your pages as if it were still there. The reader feels as if s/he were in the midst of the world that once was.

The memoir setting includes both where and when your story occurs.

[Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]

We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.

Already a Member?

Not a Member Yet?

memoir setting

Every Story Needs a Believable Memoir Setting

Writers seem to grasp that every memoir needs well-developed characters and actions, but the same is often not true when they consider memoir setting.

Too many writers omit to tell us enough of the setting of their story to make their memoir feel solid and real. It is as if we are reading about spirits who do not inhabit a tangible world.

1. Setting places your characters in a context and makes them “real.”

The memoir setting is both where and when your story occurs. [Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]

We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.

Already a Member?

Not a Member Yet?

money story

Three Points Not to Forget When You Write Your Money Story

This post originally appeared in That Money Girl blog on November 26, 2013 as Your Money Story…Pack It With Power

There is power in writing your money story. Your money story can transform you as it leads to understanding the money energy in your life and ultimately making that energy work for you.

In this post, I write about three features you must utilize in the writing of a money story. These are character, action, and setting. [Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]

We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.

Already a Member?

Not a Member Yet?