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Life Story Links: January 31, 2023
This week's curated reading list has a host of recent articles of interest to family history lovers, memoir writers (and readers), and modern memory-keepers.
“We treasure the voices of our ancestors; we warm ourselves with the worn fragments that we have of the stories of their lives. We ourselves will be ancestors one day.”
—Pat Schneider
Vintage photo of children with a puppy in New York City circa mid-twentieth century. Photograph by Morris Huberland, courtesy of The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Photography Collection, The New York Public Library Digital Collections.
Memoirs of note
HER OWN PERSONAL ARCHIVE
Janet Malcolm “knew better than most that the only thing scarier than writing about oneself is letting someone else wrest control of the narrative.”
“THE HAUNTING OF PRINCE HARRY”
“The unlettered Prince [Harry] has gained in life what Hamlet achieved only in death: his own story shaped on his own terms, thanks to the intervention of a skillful Horatio,” aka ghostwriter, J. R. Moehringer.
On permanence and legacy
AMASSING DIGITAL MEMORIES
“My intentions to document my life are pure, but as a millennial mother, if I can’t get a grip on photo organization and the sheer volume of images I snap, will all my efforts be for naught?”
HISTORY, ERASED
“To see her legacy in tatters at my feet was…a reminder of how vulnerable elderly people are when it comes to relying on successive generations to treasure what they have to pass down.”
Writing our lives
WRITING FOR THEME
“When we are our stories’ protagonists, we must project our first-person experience on that larger canvas of universal experience to show...how it connects with readers’ experience or lives.”
PRODUCTIVE PROCRASTINATION?
While researching your memoir is an intensive—and necessary—endeavor, getting caught up in a never-ending web of research will only delay your writing: Ideas for continuing (and walking away from) your personal research.
VALUE OF SELF REFLECTION
“Even if no one ever reads or listens to what you preserve, you gain from thinking about what you’re doing with your life. It isn’t too late to improve the narrative.”
WHICH MEMOIR FORMAT?
Marjorie Turner Hollman, a Massachusetts–based personal historian, shares her wisdom about how defining why you are writing a memoir will help you determine your memoir’s structure.
THE CRAFT OF MEMOIR
Award-winning memoirist and writing teacher Beth Kephart joins Ronit Plank in conversation about what distinguishes a memoir in essays, the ethics of telling other people’s stories, and much more in this episode of the Let’s Talk Memoir podcast:
Holocaust remembrance
LAST CHANCE TESTIMONY INITIATIVE
The USC Shoah Foundation plans to interview several Holocaust survivors a week at its first-ever in-person ‘memory studio’ in Los Angeles.
IN 3-D
“When we talk about millions, that’s a statistic. When we talk about one person, that’s a story.” A Miami Holocaust survivor records holographic testimony for the planned Boston Holocaust Museum.
...and a few more links
StoryTerrace’s Rutger Bruining on why it’s important to document your family history
New narrative-driven video game offering hinges on memory-keeping theme
“If You Heard What I Heard”: True stories of Holocaust survivors as told by their grandchildren
Nikole Hannah-Jones on infusing her family’s personal story into The 1619 Project docuseries
Short takes
Why you should stop researching your memoir now
Research and fact-checking are integral parts of creating your memoir—but there's a good chance that it may be getting in the way of your actually writing it.
Ten more family tree hints just popped up on your Ancestry account.
Your sister called with news that she found another box of Nanna’s family photos in the basement.
That family history blogger you love just posted a great review of a life writing book that you NEED to read!
Stop! Seriously, every day will bring a new “reason” you shouldn’t start writing your memoir. It’s time to focus on the reasons that you should.
While researching your memoir is an intensive—and necessary—endeavor, getting caught up in a never-ending web of research will only delay your writing. So, how do you know when you’ve gathered enough research to finally put pen to paper?
3 signs your research is strong enough to begin your memoir:
You’ve got more than a file folder filled with research materials.
You’ve got a stack of papers delineating a lot of puzzle pieces: dates for key events on your life timeline, photos showing places and people involved in your stories, photocopies of pages from your journals, newspaper clippings providing historical context. And you’ve got an idea in your head for the path your memoir will take. That’s enough, I say, to begin putting your puzzle together. A crucial point is that you are writing toward truth. “At some point, we have to trust what we have and what we can make of what we have,” Beth Kephart writes in Handling the Truth. “We can be absolutely sure of just one thing in all of this: that our hearts are true throughout the making of our story.”
You feel compelled to begin telling your stories but wonder if you’ve got all the facts straight.
Unless you are questioning the essential bedrock of your story, it’s time to forget about the facts and focus on your truth. When you have finished a first draft of your memoir, then you can turn your attention to fact-checking historical information such as dates or place names. I suggest devising a system early on for earmarking facts that need to be checked later: It can be as simple as a question mark in the margin or using only a pink highlighter for facts to come back to. Don’t worry about these details while you are in the flow of writing—they will slow you down unnecessarily and hamper your creativity.
Your curiosity leads you down one research rabbit hole after another.
Let’s face it, researching can be fun. You unearth something interesting about an ancestor (oh, how I’d love to know more!); discover that your neighbor was embroiled in your family drama (ah, another interview opportunity!); learn that the street your grandfather grew up on was named for his hometown in Italy (how the heck did that come about?!). Many of these nuggets have potential to add wonderful details to your story, but do they all? Probably not. Don’t go down a research rabbit hole unless you expect to find something that, when stitched into your story, helps the reader rather than distracts them. “Sidestep or leap over those rabbit holes, work on, and you’ll complete your book,” memoirist Barbara Scoblic writes. “Go down the rabbit holes and you’ll wind up with an encyclopedia instead of a memoir.” Indeed.
3 fun—and fast—ideas for researching your memoir
Before you begin writing:
Find historical context through newspapers.
No matter what time in your life your memoir hones in on, adding color and texture specific to the era will enrich your writing. Head to the library and find the local newspaper from the day you were born, perhaps. Or read the major headlines from big city newspapers on various days within your time period—the Great Depression, the Vietnam War, the carefree mid-1960s. You may find a few telling details to include, or simply get inspired by the prevailing mood of the time. Allow yourself one or two days for this research, then move on.
Midway through your writing journey:
Revisit your journals.
If you have kept a diary throughout your life and used it as a reference when deciding what to mine for your memoir, chances are you went through it fairly closely in the planning stages. Maybe you took notes, captured full quotations to include in your narrative, even narrowed down your memoir’s time frame as a result of your journal keeping. Still, it can’t hurt to reread some pages when you’re in the midst of writing your memoir. The immediacy of journal writing—the perpetual present tense, the unknowing of what is to come—can startle us back into a state of emotion; it can spark ideas that didn’t seem relevant early on but that may prove to have great resonance now that your story is unfolding.
When you’re stuck:
Talk to someone.
You thought you’d remember every detail of the day your dad walked out, but the picture is getting murky. You can’t recall why your family left that spring break vacation in Florida early, but you know in your bones it was something big. Whatever notion you’re stuck on, asking a family member, friend, or other involved party what they recollect can be helpful. If you can’t come to a consensus about “what really happened,” either use language to reveal your ambivalence (“I remembered things differently from my sister…” or “I can only use my imagination to paint a complete picture of that day…”), or write a composite of the event that is faithful to the truth as you experienced it. “If you strive for emotional honesty and permit yourself the vulnerability it requires, your reader will in all likelihood forgive your factual alteration, omission, or embellishment of details,” Tristine Rainer writes in Your Life as Story—that is, if you write authentically and do not intentionally alter events to fit a new narrative.
Yes, research is a key component of crafting your life story. Accuracy is “a first-and-foremost objective of memoir,” Marion Roach Smith has written. Just remember, there are times when setting aside the task of researching is your best course of action. Write. Just write. You can always come back to the research later. If you don’t begin to get your stories onto the page, all that research will have been a mere hobby.
Life Story Links: January 17, 2023
This week's roundup leans heavy into memoirs—including a bunch from well-known writers and editors—but includes plenty of wisdom for everyday memory-keepers, too.
“So what if your story of a small, unremarkable life is read only by you, in some quiet corner, or by one or two people you love and trust to understand? If those are people who can learn from and value it, isn’t that a notable achievement, a valuable audience?”
—Anna Quindlen
Vintage portrait of Dr. and Mrs. Martin Luther King Jr., by Herman Miller, originally appeared in the World Telegram & Sun, 1964, courtesy of Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.
Going deep
CHANNELING SOMEONE ELSE’S VOICE
"Beyond doing the writing, a good ghostwriter also encourages subjects to go beyond what they might say on their own." A look at how ghostwriters craft books in someone else’s voice, without leaving fingerprints.
TO BE CONTINUED
There are a variety of reasons—including traumatic memories—when pausing a personal history interview is the best course of action. Last week I wrote about when it makes sense to honor the silence.
SILENCE—A BETTER OPTION?
Amidst the maelstrom of coverage of Prince Harry’s blockbuster memoir, Spare, this short op-ed by Patti Davis—daughter of Ronald Reagan and author of a book she says she wishes she hadn’t written—stands out.
This and that
PASSING ON INTANGIBLE ASSETS
An ethical will “can be a meaningful component of a comprehensive legacy plan.” Susan Turnbull, a personal legacy advisor in Massachusetts, writes about why estate planners should introduce their clients to such legacy letters.
DEAR READER…
In the latest blog for the Biographers Guild of Greater New York, Anna Brady Marcus offers up six ways to use letters in your memoir projects.
PHOTO ACCOUNTING
From how our photo taking was impacted during the pandemic to how many images the average smartphone user has on their device, these statistics, facts, and predictions around our picture-taking habits are a lot to take in.
The branches of our family trees
FAMILY LORE, NOW DOCUMENTED
On the season premiere of Finding Your Roots, actor Edward Norton learned that Pocahontas is his 12th great-grandmother. You can watch the full episode here.
STRANGER THAN FICTION
Ancestry released survey findings that half of Americans know more about families from their favorite TV shows than their own family tree—and 53% can’t name all four of their grandparents. Watch an episode of their entertaining YouTube series “2 Lies and a Leaf” featuring Modern Family’s Sarah Hyland:
Writers, editors, themselves
RECORDING IT ALL
Allen “Ginsberg’s auto poesy gives us his life not merely as a collection of facts, but as an imminent reality—there for you to judge, worship, reject, envy, study, or imitate as you will.” How the poet’s self-recording sessions informed his work.
“AN EXERCISE IN INTIMATE BIOGRAPHY”
Darryl Pinckney’s memoir of his writing teacher and friend Elizabeth Hardwick “braids together Pinckney’s memories of Hardwick and her circle of New York intellectuals with his own coming-of-age story.”
THE EDITOR WHO EDITED SALINGER
“Writing about this archive is like trying to push the whole career of Gus Lobrano into a day at the office. Have I even mentioned that he was descended from pirates in New Orleans?”
“STILL PICTURES: ON PHOTOGRAPHY AND MEMORY”
“The usually brazen journalist seems intimidated by her past; perhaps thinking it held the power to wound her.” In her new memoir, Janet Malcom “often dances right up to the line of major reckonings, but before she arrives, she shyly walks off the stage.”
KAFKA’S “TAGEBÜCHER”
A new English translation of Kafka’s diaries “illuminate a great deal about his world as a German-speaking Jewish writer in Prague...[but] they also go beyond our interest in the man and his time: On every page they reveal the writer at work.”
BETWEEN THE COVERS
Influential biographer Robert Caro and editor Robert Gottlieb have worked together for more than 50 years. Turn Every Page, a documenteray exploring their relationship, is “a great profile, filled with wit, affection and detailed stories.”
...and a few more links
Short takes
“To be continued…”: When breaking up a family history interview is wise
There are a variety of reasons—including traumatic memories—when pausing a personal history interview is the best course of action. Give in to the silence if...
There are many times when it’s good to hit the proverbial pause button during a personal history interview—you can always pick up the topic during another session.
I was in a meeting with fellow personal historians recently when we got on the topic of helping our clients discuss challenging times during their personal history interviews. There was so much wisdom in that (Zoom) room and one thing I jotted down was a simple phrase: “To be continued…”.
In this case, we were talking about a son wanting to hear about specific—difficult—times in his mom’s life: These were things she didn’t talk about with her family, but that certainly contributed to her identity and outlook on life. It’s understandable that he would want to learn more about his mother’s experiences. But—and this is a big “but”—when my fellow personal historian brought up this topic during an interview session, the person answering questions only went so far before getting quiet. Was it too awful to probe? Was the subject paralyzed by bad memories associated with the experiences? Did she even want to “go there”?
As trained personal historians, my colleagues and I are accustomed to giving people space—space to formulate answers, to think, to spend time exploring memories and being heard; it is a sacred space. Often moments of quiet during an interview will lead to meaningful and surprising stories. But sometimes, well, they won’t—sometimes, those extended silences may go nowhere. And that is 100-percent okay.
And sometimes, those silences are productive in another way: A seed has been planted via the question, and that seed needs time to germinate. Hence, that phrase I took note of: “To be continued…”.
Saying those words out loud either at the end of an interview or after a pregnant pause in the midst of an interview gives the subject time and space. The words are a recognition of the fact that, yes, we can continue this topic another time. That, yes, it’s okay to give it some breathing room. And that, no, we don’t need to finish this conversation right now.
Remember, though, that it’s not only a probe of traumatic experiences that may necessitate those words, “to be continued.” You may want to turn the conversation towards something lighter and more fruitful during a personal history interview in other circumstances, too. Here are a few instances where hitting the proverbial pause button on your interview (or at least on a topic that ends in a prolonged silence) can be beneficial:
Decide to resume discussion of a topic in a subsequent family history interview when:
the interview subject feels like exploring the current topic (whether involving trauma or otherwise) is too emotional, too difficult, or too uncomfortable
the interview subject would like to consult with a family member to check details on a sensitive memory or story
the interview subject is feeling tired
the interview subject has expressed that they would like to think about how to approach the topic
the topic being discussed could reveal things that negatively impact a loved one or other individual (in this case, be sure to reiterate that anything that comes up during the interview can be removed later, whether from an edited recording, a transcript, or a book).
One other thing worth noting: All of the above reasons for breaking up a personal history interview involve some form of challenge, but there’s another strong reason for resuming conversation again later—quite simply, because every time we tell a story, new aspects of our memories may come to the fore. So each new telling of a story may add texture, details, meaning. “No memory is ever alone,” Louis L’Amour wrote, “it’s at the end of a trail of memories, a dozen trails that each have their own associations.” So take one trail today, another tomorrow. Give your subject space. Let them know it’s more than okay for your conversation “to be continued…”.
Life Story Links: January 3, 2023
A curated roundup overflowing with recent pieces about memoir writing, personal history preservation, food heritage & family stories—which will you read first?
“Love is listening.”
—Titus Kaphar
Vintage photo of kids on a cold New York City day, created by Morris Huberland between 1940-1979, courtesy of The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Photography Collection, The New York Public Library Digital Collections.
Meditations on memoir
TURNING PERSONAL NARRATIVE INTO ART
Might we see memoir as a “collaborative inquiry, author and reader facing the same questions from inside their inevitably messy lives”?
NEW YORK MAG PICKS BEST MEMOIRS OF 2022
“Call it hybrid memoir, memoir-plus, researched memoir—the industry hasn’t quite decided—but the blending of personal history with careful analysis of the cultural forces and institutions that inform it has exploded the genre with possibility.”
SCARS TELL A STORY
“Let it play out on the page,” Patricia Charpentier, a Florida–based life writing coach, says of the prompt she discusses in this episode of her Life Writers Vlog: Write about a scar (physical or emotional).
Preserving personal stories
PERSONAL ACCOUNTING
Lamorna Ash’s 2022 diary ran to 52,000 words. “I’ve been toying with giving up my chronic chronicling, perhaps even deleting the evidence,” she writes, “but something always stops me.”
THE WAY YOU TELL YOUR LIFE STORY MATTERS
"Even if no one reads or listens to your tale, you haven’t wasted your time. Reviewing your life…might give you the inspiration to mend some of your ways. It isn’t too late to improve the narrative.”
LOST TO HISTORY, NO MORE
“Much of [animator Bessie Mae] Kelley's story and work was lost to the pages of her own journals and left undocumented—until now.”
Stories and substance
ANIMATED AGAIN
In rare home movies (now archived at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum), Harry Roher’s camera captured what life was like for people in a small community in then Poland, now Ukraine, in 1936.
YOUR MEMORIES, THEIR CLOUD
“As I grappled with all the gigabytes, my concern morphed from losing it all to figuring out what was actually worth saving.” A critical look at storing digital photos and other artifacts of your memories in the cloud.
CARRYING THE DREAMS OF HER FAMILY MEMBERS
“By collecting the images and storing them together in that suitcase, Brooks had created a kind of narrative. It fell to her granddaughter to place it within the larger history of humanity.” Poet Robin Coste Lewis’s family album.
SACRED KEEPSAKES
“When we share a story about another, we invite them back into life.... We ‘remember’ them in this way. Transitional objects provide the opportunity to speak the loved ones’ name, to tell a bit of their story once more.”
THINGS THEY KEEP
In this special episode of Things That Matter with Martie McNabb, six guests from The Quietus House (hosts of a healing grief retreat in February) share things they hold dear that remind them of lost loved ones:
Cook up some memories
PRESERVING RECIPES
“The weakest ink, it turns out, is in fact better than the strongest memory, which is why many people who value recipe preservation view their written-down recipes as family heirlooms.”
FAMILY HISTORY THROUGH FOOD
When her parents wrote essays for their Chinese heritage cookbook, “some of the stories that we had heard were more vividly on display than what we had ever heard around the dinner table...[as] the medium required that we kind of render it in a lot more detail.”
...and a few more links
The New Yorker asked the daughter of artist George Booth to “bring him back to life for us.”
An interesting discussion about copyright and personal storytelling
From the Archives: Newspaper offers glimpse of life in San Diego 125 years ago.
Dani Shapiro in conversation about how writing fiction can reveal more about ourselves than writing memoir
Short takes
Life Story Links: December 13, 2022
We've got a wealth of thought-provoking stories about memory-keeping, family history preservation, and memoir in this final curated reading list of 2022.
“One is always at home in one’s past.”
—Vladimir Nabokov
Joyeux Noël! Vintage postcard of children with baby animals—illustration by Pauli Ebner, published by Max Munk—courtesy of The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Picture Collection, The New York Public Library Digital Collections.
The unexpected power of obituary writing
OVERLOOKED NO MORE
A teacher shares how he used a New York Times obituary series to show students that “history is a kind of kaleidoscope, made up of many people’s stories.”
AN EXERCISE IN LIVING
“Unlike writing an obituary for someone else, writing your own obituary gives you a chance to audit your own life. It’s helped me take note of what I want more of—and less of—in my day-to-day life.”
What to watch & what to read next
TEENAGERS TELL STORIES
I don’t know what I am more bolstered by—the power and grace of these winning 100-word personal narratives by teens, or that more than 12,000 (!!) of them wrote and submitted their mini memoir entries.
CHANGE AGENTS
From Doris Lessing’s frank memoirs of social change to less famous campaigners in decisive struggles, Sheila Rowbotham’s “top 10 dissenting life stories.”
ANIMATING ARCHIVES WITH RAW EMOTION
“In a short documentary about a troubled family relationship, Diana Cam Van Nguyen uses cuts, folds, and mixed media to bring old letters to life.” This 12-minute autobiographical, poetic film is wonderfully worth your time.
SHAPING HER HISTORY
“Understanding where we are from—who we are—is a task of nuance and nuisance,” Mary-Alice Daniel writes in this excerpt from her “memoir across three continents.”
TENDER TRIBUTE
Robert Downey Jr. turned the camera on his father, Robert Downey Sr., from 2019 until Sr.’s death in mid-2021 of complications from Parkinson’s disease. The black-and-white film is “a lively look” at the cult filmmaker. See a preview here:
Personal histories, written
END-OF-YEAR REFLECTIONS
“There's no better way to celebrate the rich, full life you've lived so far—and the big, bright future ahead—than telling your story.” Here, a few ideas from the Oprah team to get you started.
A FOCUS ON MEMORIES
I might not have time for the full-fledged memoir I want to write, but I can make time every day for this easy and significant journal exercise—and so can you: the low-pressure, high-yield memory-keeping exercise I’ve recently begun.
“WHERE I’M FROM”
“I love hearing people’s stories. But when you meet someone casually you can’t say, ‘Hi, nice to meet you. What was your childhood like?’ I liked the idea of having a container that could do this, one that we could share.” Alyson Shelton in conversation on story, connection, and an approachable writing prompt.
FOR THE FAMILY CHARTER
Charlie Carr, a family office advisor, shares his list of 10 things to leave your kids besides money—including some “items [that] are...aspirational—it’s not just who we are today, but who we want to be.”
Pictures of the past
FACES FROM THE ARCHIVES
“Because of the Holocaust, many of us have been robbed of the opportunity to see images of families that were in many cases wiped out.” Thanks to one man’s vision, the Numbers to Names organization is changing that.
THE EYES OF THE BEHOLDER
This photo exhibition that captures the ephemeral idea of home also explores the suggestion that family photos cam be akin to propaganda.
PHYSICAL HISTORY, ERASED
Her grandmother “knew that everything existed in a context, and she was determined to lay claim to her own story—of how the material things that surrounded her helped to soothe, nourish, and define her sense of family legacy, identity, and place in the world.”
“A LIFE, $12”
He bought a box of 8mm films in an antique store when he was a student, then squirreled them away. Two years later, he writes, “ I bought an old projector, loaded up that first reel, and started watching.” A journey of discovery ensued.
THINGS THAT MATTER
Matt Paxton’s tradition of telling stories prompted by Christmas ornaments helps keep his family history alive in a meaningful and fun way for his seven children. Listen in as he is a featured speaker in a recent episode of Martie McNabb’s Show & Tale podcast.
...and a few more links
Short takes
The low-pressure, high-yield memory-keeping project I’ve recently started
I might not have time for the full-fledged memoir I want to write, but I can make time every day for this easy and significant journal exercise—and so can you.
Not every memory-keeping project we undertake needs to be ambitious—even getting one short memory down on paper each night can be both enjoyable and fruitful.
I help people preserve their family stories and personal legacies for a living, and yet I am way behind in documenting my own (the cobbler’s shoes and all that).
Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I haven’t begun—I started my business after creating an heirloom book in my mom’s memory, after all. And I do create family annual books that are predominantly photo books with some text. But these don’t tell my stories—or my family stories—in the in-depth way I know I’d like to.
For the moment, I don’t have time to delve into a big project of my own, not when I am juggling so many for my clients. But that doesn’t mean I can’t do some things along the way to work towards those goals.
For example, down the road I hope to undertake (and finish!) a family heritage cookbook. This has been on my mind for a few years now. So I do little things when I can: I have scanned all my mom’s and grandmother’s handwritten recipes that mean something to me; I have handwritten the recipes for some of my son’s favorite foods, and digitized those, as well. And about twice a year when I am making something I know I’d like to include in the cookbook, I get out my good camera and take some beautifully lit shots of the ingredients, prep, and finished dish. When it comes time to make this “a project,” I’ll be well on my way.
Similarly, I have begun early steps towards a more in-depth storytelling book about my own experiences. I have made a life timeline, and brainstormed topics and themes I would like to write about. But I am still mulling over how I’d like that book to take shape, and I don’t presently have the time to devote to it.
Yet, NOT doing these things now gives me pause. I won’t say it keeps me up at night, but it did preoccupy me on a recent night when I couldn’t sleep. I am more conscious than most of how often people miss the opportunity to capture their loved ones’ stories. All too often I am helping people preserve stories through second-hand accounts—what someone remembers their father having told them before he died; or scouring a grandmother’s meager journals for snippets of her own stories.
It’s not for nothing that the single most resonant quote I share with people is this one from William Zinsser (the quote appears on the home page of my website for this reason):
“One of the saddest sentences I know is ‘I wish I had asked my mother about that.’ ”
I don’t want that to ever be a sentence my own son utters.
And so, while I am moving at a snail’s pace with the bigger memory-keeping projects I aspire to, I recently vowed to devote some time every night to a more simple memory-keeping endeavor: I have designated a journal as my “I Remember” book. In it, I try every night to write at least one sentence, maybe more, that begin with the words “I remember.”
I was inspired first by the prevalence of easy-to-maintain journals such as this line-a-day memory journal or this five-minute gratitude journal. I see these posted across my social media feeds by friends and influencers alike, and am drawn to their low-pressure approach to diary keeping. But because I want to focus right now on recording memories from my past, not my current day-to-day, I took inspiration as well from a book I was first introduced to by Dani Shapiro: I Remember, by Joe Brainard.
I have written about the value of this book before, and even shared some wonderful remembrances written by colleagues and friends here (it’s great inspiration!). So why did I never think of making this a nightly practice? Probably, I imagine, because I always tend to “think big.”
But I’ve thought of it now, and I’ve begun. And I am loving it.
How you can start your own low-pressure memory-keeping practice
Would you like to start your own low-pressure, high-yield memory keeping project?
Simply:
Buy a journal or create a new document on your computer.
Open this journal or document every day to write down one (or a few!) short remembrances. Just a sentence or two each, even a phrase if you feels it’s evocative.
Optional:
Date your entries if you like, or simply keep a continual list without regard for when you wrote them.
Set a regular time for writing in your “I Remember” journal, or carry it with you for whenever a few moments present themselves.
Consider that one day you may use this journal as a jumping-off point for a bigger personal history project—but know that by no means do you have to! This book will be chock-full of memories that I assure you will run the gamut from fun and lighthearted to deep and reflective—and it may one day be cherished by your own next of kin.
See what I mean about low pressure? Won’t you join me in this intentional remembering? Honestly, it’s one of my favorite things to do every evening, and I feel so wonderfully accomplished as the pages continue to be filled. One memory at a time…
Life Story Links: November 29, 2022
This week’s curated roundup includes so many good reads about story preservation—from planning your memoir to turning memory into art—plus, objects of affection.
“Most [people] don’t even know how impressive they are until they tell their stories to others. ‘By God, I matter!’ one woman exclaimed.”
—James E. Birren and Linda Feldman
This vintage photograph of a London street scene, taken between 1930-1950, was originally part of a scrapbook in the American Theatre Wing. Photo courtesy the Billy Rose Theatre Division, The New York Public Library Digital Collections.
The stuff of memory
PRECIOUS OBJECTS
From a chipped crystal decanter that reminds the storyteller of a bold 1911 journey to a pair of shoes worn by another narrator’s family member when fleeing the Nazis—objects hold stories.
VOICES FROM THE PAST
Her father recorded soundbites of their family life on vinyl records (some 200 of them!). Now nearing 80, Ms. Kelly has inherited these circular time capsules of domestic life, with their scratchy resurrections of the past.
’TIS THE SEASON FOR NOSTALGIA
The holidays, for many, are a time of family togetherness, tradition, and memory-making. Why not let the gifts we give to our loved ones reflect those values? My round-up of unique gifts for memory-keepers and family historians.
Story preservation planning
YOUR MEMOIR: A PLAN
“Any and every item you have penciled in on your bucket list deserves not just a little hopeful dreaming every now and then, but a plan—a way to make your future dreams your present reality!” Here, a plan to get your memoir off your bucket list and into the world.
SAFEGUARDING FAMILY STORIES
“Preserving family stories is a passion of mine, but it can often become overwhelming. There just doesn’t seem to be a clear beginning, and the ending often seems far, far away.” Lisa Duncan of Heirloom Explorer has gathered resources and her favorite Instagram accounts to inspire your own memory-keeping.
BRIDGING GENERATIONS
“When my mother died in 2014, I realized how much I didn’t know about her life. I never asked the questions that haunt me now—questions about what interactions she had, what it was like to live in her time in the places she did.” Read an excerpt from Elizabeth Keating’s new book, The Essential Questions.
Turning memory into art
IN PICTURES
Why did Steve Martin decide to turn his favorite memories as an actor into a memoir illustrated by New Yorker cartoonist Harry Bliss? Because “an anecdote in cartoon form is very succinct. You don't have to set the scene….You could just do the gist of the story.”
A PERPETUAL MEMOIRIST, RECOGNIZED
Many authors write about their lives. Over nearly fifty years, Annie Ernaux, the 2022 Nobel laureate for literature, has discovered new ways to do it.
‘TRAVEL GUIDE’ TO FAMILY’S UNSPOKEN PAST
Composer Michael Gordon’s new musical work reflects on his father’s flight from Poland in 1939 and “about what [his family] took with them, and what they didn’t; about the complications of piecing origins together amid tales unheard and traumas untold.”
CONJURING A LOVED ONE THROUGH MEMORY
“As time passes and stories pile up, it can become difficult to distinguish between original memories and those borrowed from family lore or photographs…. The animation in [the short film] The Garbage Man revels in this ambiguity, bringing together the past and the present…and sitting them all down over lunch.”
PROFILE TO EMULATE
This beautiful piece about an author I love, Octavia Butler—“the girl who grew up in Pasadena, took the bus, loved her mom and grandmother, and wrote herself into the world”—also includes links to understanding her via “her most misunderstood work; her writing style; and her famous journal entry.”
...and a few more links
“12 Months to a Full Memoir or Essay Collection:” a generative workshop with Chloe Caldwell: applications due in December
Consumer Reports: Digitizing family memories ahead of the holidays
A curated collection of preservation materials for all your family history belongings, from Gaylord Archival
“Memory and grief are at the heart of this year’s best cinema”
What meaning is held by the mysterious objects on Van Gogh’s kitchen table?
Short takes
Learn about our Write Your Life course, providing memory prompts, writing guidance and a dose of inspiration to anyone who wants to preserve their stories now.