Self Editing Your Memoir Lesson 4: Structure and Scenes
- 2. 1. At what point in your life are you telling this story? How much time has passed since the events you’re writing about? What do you know now that you didn’t know then? 2. If you had to describe your narrator’s emotional tone in no more than three words, what would they be? 3. Are there places in your current manuscript that don’t reflect that tone? If it slips away, what can you do to bring it back? 4. Do you feel like you have enough distance to let your narrator craft a compelling and consistent reader-focused story? If you still carrying a lot of emotions about the experiences you’re writing about, what are you doing to bring them to the page in ways that still offer self reflection? 5. As you consider the protagonist, does your narrator present them in a way that acknowledges their uniqueness? Have you stepped back enough to describe and reflect your personality that the reader can see how you are different than others? Are you highlighting those aspects of your personality that lead to contradictions, ambivalence or emotion?
- 3. “I am the only one who can tell the story of my life and say what it means.” - Dorothy Allison
- 6. Prologue: Tara is seven years old, looking out over the Idaho land and the mountain that she calls home. She knows she is different, without a birth certificate, and she feels pride in the way she lives, separated from the government and formal education. 1: Tara’s first memory is her father describing a violent government raid on their neighbors. He reads to the family from the Bible and decides to purge their house of dairy. He has revelations from God. He tells them not to trust the government. Tara’s grandmother offers to bring Tara to Arizona for the winter so she can go to school, but Tara backs out at the last minute, afraid to leave her family because of the danger that surrounds them. Her grandmother leaves without her. 2: A midwife visits Tara’s mother to train her to be an assistant. Mother is hesitant and shaken when she comes home from assisting her first birth. Father says she must continue as a way to build the family’s self reliance for the End Times. Despite her fear, Mother takes over as the area’s midwife, and Tara hears her stories and sees her gain confidence. Tara’s brother Luke needs a birth certificate, and Mother goes through the steps to get one for Tara, as well. Tara attends a birth with her mother and sees her strength in a new way. 3: Tara recounts the stories her mother, Faye, told of growing up “in town,” the daughter of a family that cared about social standing and appearance. Faye rebelled from their expectations when she met and married Tara’s father, Gene, an eccentric man who lives in the shadow of the mountain. Faye meets him at a party and is drawn to someone so unfamiliar. Her family objects, but Faye moves to the mountain, secluding herself in his eccentricities. Years later, Tara first hears a professor describe the term “bipolar,” and recognizes her father.
- 9. Chronological The e e
- 10. Where does the “e” begin? • The moment of crisis • Reflection • Flashback
- 11. Chronological The e Collage
- 12. Chronological The e Collage Braided
- 16. The protagonist sitting quietly at the end of the day, reflecting on what happened, or worrying about what will happen next. Two or more people engaging in the same argument or conversation more than once. A protagonist or narrator asking the same questions over and over, or worrying about the same thing. A scene or even a recurring character that doesn’t directly impact the plot.
- 19. Next Class: May 11, 2024 9:00am – 12:00pm bethjusino@gmail.com