Reflections on Writing Memoirs BLOG 1

For me writing memoir is less about the actual writing and coming up with things to say, and more the self-consciousness of it. I have no idea as to how good or bad my childhood was because I have never gone out of my way to compare mine with other people's childhood stories. I think it’s fair to say that I have been through so interesting parts of my life, but other than the self-conscious, I think the hardest part of writing a memoir or any longer writings for that matter, is I don’t know how to connect the events that I am writing about. This gives me a sort of respect for authors of any type of book but of memoirs especially, being that they have actually been through the things they write about. I have no idea what so ever as to what complications memoir writers have when writing their life stories. I would assume it is along the lines of what all people have trouble with, but it would be interesting to ask one. Sometimes I wonder how much of the things the writers write about they actually remember, probably not the dialogue they say, which leads me to my next question, how did they come up with it and how did they decide where or when to use dialogue. Maybe that’s a difficultly they have, writing in a way that doesn’t have much dialogue, and keep it in a past tense point of view and yet keep their writing entertaining or their readers entertained. That would be a major concern for me at least. I hope in the memoirs I read this year will help me compare both the author’s story with mine and the author’s story with other author’s stories that way I can get some perspective on writing memoirs and maybe even writing in general.