***The Art of Memoir Writing

Written by Lynn Wiese Sneyd

Does everyone have a book in them, a book about their personal story? Most people probably do — after all, life can be stranger than fiction.

Can everyone write a book? Now that’s an entirely different story.

Recently, I heard a publisher describe memoir as a “complicated literary undertaking.” An editor friend of mine called it a “challenging feat.”

Why did they use such daunting terms?

Let’s look at what memoir writing entails by comparing memoir to autobiography. Both genres are told in first person and both recount truths about the author’s life. An autobiography, though, tends to cover a person’s entire life, from childhood to the current time. No one incident or event is emphasized more than another. Most often, the narrative is linear; it doesn’t jump around in time, but steadily progresses from beginning to end.

Memoir differs in a number of ways. First, it may only focus on a period of time. In Eat, Pray, Love, author Elizabeth Gilbert centers her story on one year of her life. She includes brief insights into her childhood, but those details are minimal. If she had written an autobiography, she would have started with her childhood and told about growing up, going to college, starting her writing career, and traveling for a year around the world. Her account of the year abroad would have been far less personal.

Memoir is personal., and that’s what makes it such a “challenging feat” to write. Again, this from my editor friend:

“When I think of tough memoirs, like The Liars Club, what lifts them up and allows people to come to them and want to read them is the voice of the author who is able to create a sympathetic tone in spite of all that is tragically unfolding. In books such as that, the author is able to create a sympathetic picture of the flawed family members that elicits feelings of connection from the readers.”

Indeed, this is a writing challenge, one that requires the writer to embrace and learn the craft, the art, the technique – call it what you will – of writing about character and place.

If you choose to write memoir, and we Boomers have some pretty incredible stories to share, take time to study bestselling memoirs. Read from the point of view of a writer. How is the author revealing the story, creating depth in the characters, drawing in the reader? Attend workshops on writing memoir. Read books on the craft. Join a writing critique group. All of these steps will help you create a narrative that will touch and inspire others.