Maya Angelou had a tough life. Like absolutely horrible. She enjoyed the little things in life more than I would if I was going through what she did. Maya was raped and abused. And she blamed herself for it. She blamed herself for her rapists death. She traveled unwillingly. She just had a messed up, complicated life. But, in the end of all of her struggles came a great Memoir.
How can I even start to write a memoir without those struggles? I'm growing up in a loving safe household. We always have just the right amount of money and I don't worry about my safety to much. If I'm not struggling, how can I make my memoir interesting? I would have to talk about the main struggle in my life, which compared to so many authors is nothing. I will have to learn how to incorporate excruciating detail into every single thing I tell about my life.
I can learn a lot from Maya Angelou. Her persistence in life throughout her hardships inspire me to fight hard regardless the circumstance. She learned to make the nice parts of her life super interesting to read, which I can use when writing my own memoir. She uses interesting details with everything she writes and uses topics or events to go into other events smoothly. She makes her writing interesting whether its a good or bad experience. I need to learn from this book how to take my good experiences and make them entertaining for everyone.
In the end, Maya Angelou's struggles taught me, as well as many other people what a good memoir consists of. Not just hardships, but a good, descriptive way of writing. I thing we can all learn to value our privileged lives just like Maya continued to value hers regardless.
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ReplyDeleteHey Kaleigh! You are asking good questions about finding a memoir topic to write about. Keep in mind that we don't have to experience the same things that Angelou went through in order to write a well written memoir. Great writers can make the seemingly mundane details of life interesting. It is great that you are aware of your comforts and privileges but those things don't mean you don't have something important to say. I bet you've got some cool stories to tell! Remember, it is a matter of how you tell your story! Employing the literary devices we've learned in class so far will help. I wonder if you found something to write about during our in class writing day?
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