I completed the first writing exercise from Your Life as Story. The author assigned a fairy tale — the writerÂ’s own. She said it could be three sentences or as long as one wanted. It simply needs to contain:
- A beginning in which something happened so that a person had a problem and a need.
- As the person pursued his or her desire a struggle ensued.
- And in the end the person changed with a realization.
She instructed not to overthink these, but to just start with “once upon a time” and to write in third person.
The second part of the exercise was to write a short letter to a grandchild or child sharing what it is I learned from my life. This letter should contain an important insight, vision of reality, or bit of wisdom I wish to pass on.
As I wrote my story, I realized all the details I left out, as well as the different perspectives from which this tale could be told. For example, within this story about my endeavor to get an education await the relationships I had that started and ended; these too had an effect on my goal, but to incorporate them would overwhelm the tale. As I wrote, I also saw other fairy tales I could tell about that time of my life offering other themes and lessons; and, of course, I detected a cache of narratives about other times of my life.
Mostly I had fun writing the story, and this in itself made the endeavor worthwhile.
I see what I created as raw material, pieces of which can be used as source for a poem, or re-worked for an article or essay. This book is amazing. IÂ’ve only just begun, but her premise is to teach how to use story structure in writing autobiography. IÂ’ve never been interested in writing fiction, though IÂ’ve felt as though I should be; I perceived nonfiction as the domain of published novelists — a prerequisite, I suppose. I hesitated to write seriously or consider myself a candidate for publication, because the most natural form is telling my own life stories; being an obscure person among billions, I thought it not worth pursuing. Then I discovered blogging, which provided a means of expression. But itÂ’s too rough — the result is not polished. It is also too immediate; it doesn’t encourage discretion. Others can be harmed in very real ways by self-revelation, especially on the Internet, and this awareness begets self-censorship. IÂ’ve been drawn to reading memoirs in recent years, almost more so than fiction. I think I have found my genre. I may never share what I write, but it now feels real and legitimate.