Memoir Example
Literary History is awash with great memoirists who have been writing in the style of narrative nonfiction since well before the phrase was coined. Below, enjoy quotes from great memoirists and link to their work.
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Everything here speaks now, as it did centuries ago, of illumination,
of blinding, joyous illumination. Light acquires a transcendental
quality; it is not the light of the Mediterranean alone, it is
something more, something unfathomable, something holy. Here the light
penetrates directly to the soul, opens the doors and windows of the
heart, makes one naked, exposed, isolated in a metaphysical bliss which
makes everything clear without being known. No analysis can go on in
this light: here the neurotic is either instantly healed or goes mad.
I used to have a cat, an old fighting tom, who would jump through the
open window by my bed in the middle of the night and land on my chest.
I'd half-awaken. He'd stick his skull under my nose and purr, stinking
of urine and blood. Some nights he kneaded my bare chest with his front
paws, powerfully, arching his back, as if sharpening his claws, or
pummeling a mother for milk. And some mornings I'd wake in daylight to
find my body covered with paw prints in blood; I looked as though I'd
been painted with roses.
So I took the exam, passed it, took the physical, passed it,
and there I was—a substitute mail carrier. It began easy. I was
sent to West Avon Station and it was just like Christmas except I didn't
get laid. Every day I expected to get laid but I didn't. But the soup
was easy and I strolled around doing a block here and there. I didn't
even have a uniform, just a cap. I wore my regular clothes. The way my
shackjob Betty and I drank there was hardly money for clothes.
I read the character and set description despite the sudden perversity
of my body. The blood pounded in my ears but not enough to drown the
skinny sound of my voice. My hands shook so that I had to lay the
pages in my lap, but that was not a good solution due to the tricks my
knees were playing. They lifted voluntarily, pulling my heels off the
floor and then trembled like disturbed Jello. Before I launched into
the play's action, I looked around at the writers expecting but hoping
not to see their amusement at my predicament. Their faces
were studiously blank. Within a year, I was to learn that each had a
horror story about a first reading at the Harlem Writers Guild.
A trailer door opened and a young woman stepped out, leading a child
who beat upon her legs with a wooden spoon. The woman was topless, and
her breasts hung like two kneesocks, each stuffed with a single orange.
I knew when I signed up that I would encounter exposed breasts, but
this being my first pair, I reacted with alarm. She wore her hair in a
neglected shag and scolded the child for a moment or two before
gathering him up in her arms and burying her sharp-featured face in his
stomach. Topless. She was topless, walking the streets of what amounted
to her neighborhood. The boy howled with pleasure and then rapped her
over the head with his spoon.
Come here till I comb your hair, said Grandma. Look at that mop, it
won't lie down. You didn't get that hair from my side of the family.
That's that North of Ireland hair you got from your father. That's the
kind of hair you see on Presbyterians. If your mother had married a
proper decent Limerick man you wouldn't have this standing up, North of
Ireland, Presbyterian hair.
She spat twice on my head.
Grandma, will you please stop spitting on my head.
If you have anything to say, shut up. A little spit won't kill you. Come on, we'll be late for the Mass.
And then, on September 11, the world fractured.
It's beyond my skill as a writer to capture that day, and the days that would follow—the planes, like specters, vanishing into steel and glass; the slow motion cascade of towers crumbling into themselves; the ash covered figures wandering the streets; the anguish and the fear. Nor do I pretend to understand the stark nihilism that drove the terrorists that day and htat drives their brethren still. My powers of emphathy, my ability to reach into another's heart, cannot penetrate the blank stares of those who would murder innocents with abstract, serene satisfaction.
My first soccer game with Luca Spaghetti was, for me, a delirious
banquet of Italian language. I learned all sorts of new and interesting
words in that stadium which they don’t teach you in school. There was
an old man sitting behind me, stringing together such a gorgeous
flower-chain of curses as he screamed down at the players on the field.
I don’t know all that much about soccer, but I sure didn’t waste any
time asking Luca inane questions about what was going on in the game.
All I kept demanding was, “Luca, what did the guy behind me just say?
What does cafone mean?” And Luca never taking his eyes from the field
would reply, “Asshole. It means asshole.”
I would write it down. Then shut my eyes and listen to some more of the old man’s rant, which went something like:
Dai, dai, dai, Albertini, dai va bene, va bene, ragazzo mio,
perfetto, bravo, bravo Dai! Dai! Via! Via! Nellaporta!Eccola, eccola,
eccola, mio bravo ragazzo, caro mio, eccola, eccola,
eccoAAAHHHHHHHHH!!! VAFFANCULO!!! FIGLIODI MIGNOTTA!! STRONZO! CAFONE!
TRADITORE! Madonna Ah, Dio mio, perch,perch,perch, questo stupido, una
vergona, la vergogna Che casino, che bordello NON HAI UN CUORE,
ALBERTINI! FAI FINTA!Guarda, non successo niente Dai, dai, ah. Molto
migliore, Albertini, molto migliore, s s s, eccola, bello, bravo,anima
mia, ah, ottimo, eccola adesso nella porta, nella porta,
nellVAFFANCULO!!!!!!!
There were many, many fine reasons not to go, but attempting to climb
Everest is an intrinsically irrational act -- a triumph of desire over
sensibility. Any person who would seriously consider it is almost by
definition beyond the sway of reasoned argument.
The plain truth is that I knew better but went to Everest anyway. And
in doing so I was a party to the death of good people, which is
something that is apt to remain on my conscience for a very long time.
