Description
So, you have an idea for a memoir or you’ve already started, but you’re wondering how exactly you will write about that one particularly painful memory or your experience with trauma… or your father who is super messed up and what if he read your memoir? Or your father has been dead for years, and is it fair to write ill of the dead especially since your other parent is still living?
Maybe you are the writer who says you’re working on a memoir except you have been bogged down in the research for months (eh, years), and the research is about that difficult situation at the very heart of your memoir.
Maybe people have told you that you’re keeping the hard stuff at the edge of your narrative, and that you need to make it more central to the work, but you’re wondering how exactly to do that.
In this workshop, we are going to talk about self-care for the memoir and the memoir writer. In the first half of our time together, I will share techniques on how to approach yourself and your memoir with compassion and care. You will also do short journaling exercises that will help you to better understand if it’s the right time to tackle the hard stuff in your memoir. In the second half, I will share writing exercises that allow you to face that difficult material including how to skip it when that would be the right approach. These exercises are grounded in nonfiction works that I will share during the seminar. Come with your notebook and pen and bring all the fears and questions you have.
