Posts tagged ‘memoir’
A few years ago I worked with Marie Rudisill on her life history. If the name sounds familiar, Marie has a couple of claims to fame. She was the aunt of Truman Capote, and she helped raise him in Monroeville Alabama, whenever his mother dropped him off on her way to New Orleans. She is also known as “The Fruitcake Lady” from her appearances on The Tonight Show in Jay Leno.
Marie’s book is labeled a memoir, but it is also a personal story, a family tale, an account of all the places Marie laid down roots after she left home.
Photo by: Daniel Mennerich
Wherever Marie lived, she found a community. During the 1930s, she lived in New York City to be near her older sister Lillie Mae and her nephew Truman. Of the Big Apple she comments, it “didn’t have one of anything. My goodness, no. There was not just one square, skyscraper, movie house, art museum, science museum, park, playground, hotel, restaurant, deli, diner, dance hall, concert venue, night club, racetrack, bowling alley, outdoor market, or department store, but lots of everything to suit just about everyone.”
Marie made her home in Greenwich Village, of which she writes, “Greenwich Village, in particular, was a real melting pot of Italians, Germans, Poles, Africans, and Jews. They were mostly of an older generation who had immigrated to American through Ellis Island, but they peacefully co-existed with the painters, writers, and intellectuals of the next generation. Into the mix were young, single, working professionals who were attracted by the neighborhood’s low rents and Bohemian lifestyle. In the summertime everyone gathered on the front stoop looking for a breeze to cool off, but there wasn’t much relief from the humidity, even after the sun had set. When the weather turned cold and nasty we took refuge in the tearoom and coffee shops.”
On a personal level, Marie notes, “The best thing about the Village was its friendly atmosphere, and it attracted lots of Southerners. With my pronounced Southern accent, as strong as it ever was, I had always felt like I stuck out. In the Village I fit right in.”
When she married, she moved with her husband to the Carolinas. Of Charlotte, she writes, “Another thing about Charlotte is that the people are so damn nice. They truly are…. Neighbors know each other and talk to each other… In Charlotte, when a new family moved into the neighborhood, we welcomed them with a fresh meringue pie. That custom is still true, unless we’re talking about Northerners who haven’t learned to mind their p’s and q’s. Them we’ll ice up. Southerners can be very clannish.”
Marie saves her bon mots for Florida, where she retired to be near her son. She never really appreciated the Sunshine State, and she writes, “It is not a Southern state, not to me. It has no history, no civility, no gentility. It’s all flip flops, short shorts, and hairy legs.”
What is community? One simple definition is that it’s a social unit that shares common values, resources, and preferences. Those in a community take risks together, and they benefit from taking those risks – together.
Community can be a part of a life or family history. It says something about where you lived and when you grew up. Why not write about it?
© 2016 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
Photo by: Lumeimages.com
Patricia Arquette has had an interesting life. While growing up, her family lived for a time on a commune. As a child, she refused braces for her teeth, as she thought her flaws would make her a better actress. From starting in the movies in A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987) to winning an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, among other awards, for BoyHood (2014), she also has had star turns on television in Medium (2005-2011) and now on CSI: Cyber. Her father, grandfather, and great-grandfather were all performers, and her siblings are in the business. Now she’s going to write about it.
Arquette has inked a contract with Random House for her book, although a release date has not yet been set. Of her new endeavor she says, “Writing a memoir is a lot of different things. It’s illuminating, painful, interesting and strange. … It’s very personal and a big challenge.”
Are you up for the challenge?
© 2015 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
When I work on client memoirs, I like to bring in as much social history as I can. After all, each and every one of us have a front seat to history, and that history makes us and shapes us, individually and collectively. It also resonates today. If you are thinking about your personal or family history, consider what past events influenced the way you think and feel.
Photo by: © retroartist
Here are some suggestions pertaining to the Fifties for you to consider.
- Bond and Brown. That’s James Bond in Spectre and Charlie Brown in Peanuts, who, earlier this month, were numbers one and two at the box office, respectively. The iconic Secret Service agent first showed up in novelist Ian Fleming’s Casino Royale in 1953. Sean Connery played the first James Bond on the big screen in Dr. No in 1962. Peanuts, a 3D computer-animated movie, commemorates the 65th anniversary of the popular comic strip.
- Polio take down. Jonas Salk developed a vaccine to immunize children against polio in 1952. After extensive testing and the subsequent licensing of the product, it became universally available in 1955. Although polio has been eradicated in the U.S., it is still recommended that babies receive three dosages starting at two months of age and a booster shot when four to six years old.
- City or suburbs. Taking a cue from Levittown be it in New York, New Jersey, or Pennsylvania, the suburbs boomed in the Fifties. But where will Millennials chose to live? Right now, they seem to enjoy urban areas, close to work and play. Census data and survey results, however, suggests that many still yearn for the single-family houses where they grew up.
- In the matter of. The Supreme Court handed down its landmark decision in Brown versus Board of Education in 1953. Unanimously, the court declared that “separate educational facilities” for black children were “inherently illegal.”
- Baby, it’s cold outside. Tensions ran high during the Cold War, when the West grew anxious over the Soviet Union’s push to advance communism around the globe. Here at home, Senator Joseph McCarthy fueled the fear in 1950 by declaring, “The State Department is infested with communists,” and he went after them furiously and recklessly. In 1954 the Senate voted to condemn him for his behavior to “obstruct the constitutional processes of the Senate, and to impair its dignity.” The House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC), which tracked down Communist sympathizers in Hollywood, thrived in part due to McCarthy’s actions. The recently released movie, Trumbo, tells the story of screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, one of hundreds who were blacklisted, that is, denied employment for their suspected political beliefs.
- Hasta luego. The Cuban Revolution took place from 1953 – 1959, when the rebels overthrew the Batista regime and Fidel Castro established a communist government. Two years later President Eisenhower shuttered the American embassy in Havana. After months of negotiations to restore diplomatic relations, Cuba reopened its embassy in Washington D.C. in July of this year and we reopened our embassy on the island in August. Tensions between the two nations still exist, but travel restrictions have been relaxed. It’s possible that U.S. airlines will begin offering regularly scheduled flights to Cuba in the not too distant future. See you soon.
- Work hard; play hard. Hugh Hefner first published Playboy magazine in 1953, putting actress Marilyn Monroe on its cover. Known for decades for its scantily dressed, if dressed at all, centerfolds, it announced last month that it will no longer feature full nudity, as it can’t compete with pornography on the Internet, only a click away.
- In living color. The New Year’s Day Tournament of Roses Parade in 1954 was the first national television broadcast in color. Bonanza, the television program chronicling the adventures of the Cartwright family on the Ponderosa ranch, was one of the first series to be filmed and broadcast in color. First airing in 1958, it lasted fourteen years. You can still catch the show in syndication.
- United we stand. In 1959 Alaska and Hawaii became the 49th and 50th states, respectively.
- It’s now or never. I can’t write about the Fifties without mentioning Elvis. In August 1953, Elvis first walked into the offices of Sam Phillips’ Sun Records. In an evening session in July, 1954 with Scotty Moore and Bill Black, he recorded “That’s All Right” which Memphis DJ Dewey Phillips played to great reception. In 1956 Elvis’ “Heartbreak Hotel” became a number one hit in the U.S. Later that year he appeared on The Milton Berle Show, The Steve Allen Show, and The Ed Sullivan Show. He also made his first movie, Love Me Tender. In 1958 he was drafted. In March, 1960 he was honorably discharged and returned home.
A lot happens in a decade. What music were you dancing to?
© 2015 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
There are stories all around us.
Just this morning I opened my San Diego Union-Tribune to the front page of the Sports section, and there was a picture of Roseanne Barr. She wore an extra large men’s white pullover. Her hair was cropped short, and her mouth was open. So, what else is new? Well, the photo wasn’t. It was taken twenty-five years ago when Barr sang the national anthem during a Reds-Padres double-header in Cincinnati.
Stock Image: Depositphotos
Do you remember what is considered the worst performance ever? Barr didn’t just sing off-key, she screeched. She put her fingers in her ears to block out the crowd: they were booing. When she finished singing, if you can call it that, she grabbed her crotch in imitation of a ball player. When she walked away from the microphone, she made an obscene gesture and spit.
Pundits called her rendition the “Barr-Mangled Banner.” Fans were outraged. Patriots were offended. Players were embarrassed. How could this have happened? Well, the backstory is interesting.
Producer Tom Werner and a group of investors had purchased the Padres the month before. Werner, co-founder of the Carsey-Werner Company and responsible for many hits, such as Mork & Mindy, Bosom Buddies, 3rd Rock from the Sun, was executive producer of Roseanne, then the most watched television show in the country. Either wanting to promote his program or endear himself to its star, who was notoriously difficult, he suggested Barr’s appearance to his colleagues.
There was some pushback. The Padres’ vice president of public relations first worried whether Barr could sing. “Don’t worry about it,” he was told. He suggested that she sing ”Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” figuring no harm, no foul balls. Nope, Roseanne wanted to sing the national anthem, and what Roseanne wanted….
After the fiasco Roseanne was asked if she had any regrets about her performance. As befits a comedic queen, she’s quoted as responding, “Do I regret that the next day all of my projects were canceled and I had to have LAPD stand on my roof and protect me and my kids for two years?” On and on she went. Not quite as amusing, especially to Werner, was the drop from twenty-one million to less than seventeen million viewers the following season of Roseanne.
Barr, wanting a second chance, took singing lessons. Years later she showed how it should be done by performing the national anthem at a girls softball game near her home in Hawaii. It was recorded for her Lifetime reality show Roseanne’s Nuts.
It just goes to show it’s never too late to make amends.
© 2015 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
When writing a life of family history, we all struggle for the truth. But the truth is a funny thing. It’s shielded by feelings and clouded by memory.
Illustration by: © marish
In his 1997 memoir All Over but the Shoutin’, Rick Bragg writes of his childhood, growing up poor in the deep South, essentially fatherless, but supported by a hard-working mother and her family. He describes his restlessness, moving around before settling down as a journalist, never forgetting his kith and kin.
Bragg believes he was born to write. As he tells it, “The only thing I was ever any good at was in the telling and hearing of stories, and there was no profit in that. I cannot truthfully even say that I went to work for my high school newspaper because of a love for writing. Writing was hard work. It made your hand cramp, and I couldn’t type a lick. Telling stories was something you did on your porch.”
But telling stories also got Bragg writing assignments working for small town newspapers across the South. He eventually earned an award fellowship to Harvard University. The New York Times hired him as a journalist.
Of New York City, he writes, “Through one of the coldest, nastiest winters on record, I roamed that giant, confusing place, but to say I searched for stories would be a lie. I did not have to search. New York hurled stories at you like Nolan Ryan throws fastballs. All you had to do was catch them, and try not to get your head knocked off.”
Bragg won a Pulitzer for his writing, but his proudest moments came from telling the truth. Of his work he says, “It wasn’t that I had gotten it right – God knows I mess up a lot – but that I had gotten it true.”
© 2015 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
Within the past decade, Personal History Awareness Month – it’s May – was added to Chase’s Calendar of Events. Although this publication, first created in 1957, is now 752 pages and contains more than 12,000 entries worldwide, I think it says something that one of those entries highlights personal history.
illustration of head with colorful gears
As Sarah White, President of the Association of Personal Historians, says, “If you ever received something in writing from an ancestor ― a diary, a letter or better yet, a memoir ― you’ve already felt how important it is to preserve our stories for future generations.”
More and more folks are putting pen to paper, organizing their photos in a scrapbook, or recording their memories in a video. The popularity of memoirs as a type of literary non-fiction underscores how much we enjoy learning about other people. Their lives resonate with our lives. Alicia Florrick, the television character on which The Good Wife revolves, recently hired a ghostwriter to help with the task. While I have the feeling she’s deep shelving the project to return to the practice of law, that’s no reason for others to give up after an episode or two.
There’s help out there. The Association of Personal Historians, founded in 1995, has 600 members strong, who are devoted to helping those with an interest in preserving their past. If you want to do-it-yourself there are plenty of courses on-line or workshops at local community colleges.
So, clear your desk. Open your mind. And get ready to fill your thoughts with days gone by.
What? Nothing’s happening?!? That’s not possible.
What do you know about your parents and grandparents? What do you remember about growing up – your room, your school. your neighborhood? Are you on the path you want to be on? What mistakes do you keep making? What stories do you keep telling yourself? Do they share a common theme?
Examining your own life can make a difference, not only for future generations, but for yourself, as well. It’s all part of Personal History Awareness Month.
© 2015 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
Continuing to work my way through the recommendations of the Association of Personal Historians on books with guidance on preserving one’s life or family history, I picked up a copy of To Our Children’s Children by Bob Greene and D.G. Fulford. First published in 1993, it continues to be helpful and inspiring. There are about 5 questions on each page of the two hundred-page book.
Illustration by: © iqoncept
The first section covers the facts, just the facts, ma’am.
The facts include your name, gender, date of birth, and place of birth. They deal with basic data on your parents, your grandparents, your spouse, and your children.
Just to spice up the details, unless you’ve given up salt, there are questions on being right-handed or left-handed, near-sighted or far-sighted, and overweight or underweight.
Subsequent sections deal with all of the above in much more detail. Some of the many other topics addressed are the neighborhood where you grew up and the community where you live now, your education and career, your favorite holidays and celebrations, your hobbies and vacations, and your personality and life philosophy. Politics and history are also noted with questions that begin with: “Where were you when…?” For extra credit, the authors suggest answering the “hard” questions: Whom do you trust? Whom do you envy? What do you regret?
When working on a life or family history, I prefer to let the client dictate those areas on which he or she wants to focus. One memory often leads to other memories, and many more questions arise. Different subjects surface. Themes emerge. Still, when the going gets tough and nothing seems to move the project forward, I’m glad I have a copy of To Our Children’s Children.
© 2015 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
The Oscars are over. Birdman, a fictional story of a washed up actor desperately wanting to be relevant, walked away with the most prestigious awards. Although nominated, American Sniper, while earning the biggest box office, won none, nor did Wild, both of which chronicle actual events.
Still, movies based on true stories did quite well at the 87th Academy Awards. Consider that American Sniper, The Imitation Game, Selma, and The Theory of Everything, all commemorating a person, an event, or both, represented four of the eight nominations for Best Picture.
Illustration by: BlueLela
Bradley Cooper (American Sniper) and Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game) were nominated for Best Actor for their portrayals, respectively, of Chris Kyle and Alan Turing, while Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything) won for his depiction of the world-renowned physicist Stephen Hawking. Hawking was so pleased with the film that following a screening he sent director James Marsh an email, exclaiming that “there were certain points when [I] felt [I] was watching [myself.] The Academy also recognized Mark Ruffalo (Foxcatcher) with the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role in the true crime drama.
The fairer half in the best and/or supporting actor/actress categories received kudos as well for playing film versions of real-life people. Although the Best Actress award went to Julianne Moore (Still Alice), the Academy nominated both Reese Witherspoon (Wild) and Felicity Jones (The Theory of Everything). Jane Hawking had the same reaction as her ex-husband watching Jones with Redmayne, saying, “’How can I be on the screen and in a cinema seat at the same time?” Nominations in the Best Supporting Actress category included Keira Knightley (The Imitation Game) and Laura Dern (Wild).
The movie-going audience seems to love seeing real-life past or present personalities come to life on the big screen, whether they’re known for their music, their athletic prowess, their survival skills, their idealism, their creativity, or a quirk of fate. The stories come from history books and biographies. Last year’s Dallas Buyer’s Club originated with a lengthy newspaper article and then expanded to interviews with Ron Woodruff, on whose life the movie was based, and his personal journals.
And then there are memoirs. Following in the footsteps not only of Reese Witherspoon, but also, in former years, Diane Lane in Under the Tuscan Sun and Julia Roberts in Eat Pray Love, Jennifer Lawrence plans on producing and starring in The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls’ account of her nomadic childhood with her dysfunctional family. The book was a best seller, and the movie should be a hit. It might even garner a couple of Oscar nominations for its star.
© 2015 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
For an opinion of the best movies adapted from memoirs, visit flavorwire.
Stock image: Depositphotos
Upon joining the Association of Personal Historians, a growing organization of professionals committed to helping anyone who wants to preserve their life and family stories, I thought I’d check out some of the recommended resources on memoir writing to hone my craft. I started with Natalie Goldberg’s Old Friend from Far Away.
Goldberg is a poet, an author, and a writing teacher. She inspires and encourages writing, in general, and writing memoirs, more specifically, with beautiful language, thoughtful advice, and practical exercises. But she’s also a disciplinarian, a stickler for details. She won’t accept excuses, although she’d be pleased if you wrote about them.
Goldberg rounds up the usual subjects that you can cover in a memoir – grade school, driving lessons, favorite holidays, and places called home. And then there’s the unusual – your mother’s shoes, your father’s dresser, your brother’s bicycle. Regardless, her exercises always have a point: she wants you to get in the practice of writing. As she observes, “There are no prescriptions in writing, no one way that will get you there forever. A little jig, a waltz, the cha cha, the lindy, a polka – it’s good to know a lot of moves, so when it’s your time, which is right now, you can dance your ass off.”
If you’re writing a life history, Goldberg also wants you to get in the routine of remembering. “Memory doesn’t work so directly,” she advises. “You need to wake up different angles.” Often her directive following her ruminations on a topic is: “Go. Ten minutes.” On this particular subject it’s to spend time on the phrase “I remember.”
As imaginative as some of Goldberg’s suggestions are, not everyone will willingly go where she leads. Clients might not feel like jotting down their thoughts about sex or money. Thinking about “the road not taken” or describing a winter funeral once attended might be deemed counterproductive to the task at hand. However, her sentiments are heart-felt and wise.
I recommend Old Friend From Far Away to anyone who wants to step through the looking glass into a seemingly distant world. Objects in the mirror are closer than they appear, especially if you practice.
© 2015 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
One of the things that struck me when reading Tobias Wolff’s This Boy’s Life was the music that was always playing in the background.
Stock image: Depositphotos
In his memoir, Wolff tells of his itinerant childhood in the 1950s. At the beginning of his story Wolff, about eleven years old, and his mother ran from her abusive boyfriend in Florida. Arriving in Salt Lake City, but finding no work, they drove on. Wolff writes, “As we drove, we sang – Irish ballads, folk songs, big-band blue. I was hooked on ‘Mood Indigo.’ Again and again I world-wearily crooned, ‘You ain’t been blue, no, no, no’ while my mother eyed the temperature gauge and babied the engine. Then my throat dried up on me and left me croaking.”
Settling in Seattle his mother remarried. Following a Thanksgiving dinner with his rather dysfunctional family, they sang. “We sang ‘Harvest Moon,’ ‘Side by Side,’ ‘Moonlight Bay,’ ‘Birmingham Jail,’ and ‘High above Cayuga’s Waters,’” Wolff recalled, adding, “I got compliments for knowing all the words.”
Wolff’s stepfather, Dwight Hansen, was determined to teach the rebellious boy some life lessons, believing no pain, no gain. Relating a particularly ugly argument whereby Dwight beat him up, Wolff notes, “I learned a couple of lessons. I learned that a punch in the throat does not always stop the other fellow. And I learned that it’s a bad idea to curse when you’re in trouble, but a good idea to sing, if you can.”
At the end of the story, Wolff looks back to a time when he was sixteen years old, riding around with his friend Chuck Bolger, who had just found out that he wouldn’t be sent to jail. “Finally he turned off the radio, and we sang Buddy Holly songs for a while. When we got tired of those, we sang hymns. First we sang ‘I Walk to the Garden Alone’ and ‘The Old Rugged Cross,’ and a few other quiet ones, just to find our range and get in the spirit. Then we sang the roofraisers. We sang them with respect and we sang them hard, swaying from side to side and dipping our shoulders in counterpoint. Between hymns we drank from the bottle. Our voices were strong,” he recounts. “It was a good night to sing and we sang for all we were worth, as if we’d been saved.”
Are you writing your memoir or life history? What music rocks your world?
© 2015 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved
Your Biography 2 