I often get this question when I tell people that I’m writing a memoir about my childhood. My first thought is always Why? Does it seem like I need therapy?
In all seriousness, the answer for me would have to be: sometimes. Sometimes it can, indeed, be therapeutic to write. For example, an old friend/flame of mine recently passed away and almost immediately after I learned of his death, I found myself writing a poem. Even though I hadn’t written poetry in nearly a decade, somehow that medium seemed to best capture the anguish I was feeling over the loss.
But in terms of my memoir, writing isn’t about therapy. In fact, I am certain that I would not be able to write this memoir unless I had already been through extensive therapy. This isn’t that, and only by having already worked through the emotional anguish that accompanied the losses of my childhood would I be able to focus on telling the story, and on telling it in a way that I hope will offer up larger truths about relationships and family secrets and the times we live in. For me, writing this book is about telling a story that is unusual and interesting and begs to be told. It’s all about the story.
And it’s important for me to keep that in mind as I write. The internal life of the writer is important, even required, for an effective and honest memoir. But in order to write a work that is as interesting to others as it is to the writer, you cannot allow yourself to get mired in that aspect of your memoir. You must continually focus on the story – always the story!
So I write on, continually asking myself, “So, what happened next and why does it matter?” And the next time someone asks me if writing about my childhood is therapy, perhaps I’ll offer up my latest poem as an example of writing that is, indeed, therapy.
Recent Comments