I have just finished reading my former professor Jay Ponteri's essay, In Defense of Navel Gazing, published in a recent edition of Oregon Humanities magazine. This is a resonant piece for any of us who grapple with the stigma of memoir, an impulse to extract the writing we offer to others from within ourselves. Is memoir narcissistic? Poor writing? Amateurish, the dreaded navel gazing? In his essay, Jay Ponteri elegantly validates those of us who find the deepest satisfaction when writing about interior and private moments. When I’m writing a piece based on an experience, fiction or non-fiction, I have a mantra streaming through my consciousness—how am I connecting this to others? What aspect of this particular experience will resonate with an audience? How am I moving my particulars to universals that have meaning for others?
Referencing Joan Didion's memoir, The Year of Magical Thinking, Jay notes: "As a reader, I don’t question "whether Didion is indulging herself or exploiting her experience [] because I’m too busy feeling the contradictions in Didion’s heart. The prose transfers them from hers to mine." I feel this transfer, too, when I read a story like A Three Dog Life, or Jeanette Walls’ The Glass Castle, or a story like Amy Bloom’s Silver Water. These are the authors’ particular stories, but the pain of loss, the reverberating anxiety of chaos, the unresolvable aspects of madness and/or futility—these aren't singular moments. Most of us have lived one or all of these challenges, and empathy proverbially sets us apart from lizards. When they are artfully told, we hear others’ stories, and through their catharses or at least resolutions, we bond—nodding our heads, or wiping our tears, or jamming up the volume on that transgressive song we play when we’re in agony.
Referencing Joan Didion's memoir, The Year of Magical Thinking, Jay notes: "As a reader, I don’t question "whether Didion is indulging herself or exploiting her experience [] because I’m too busy feeling the contradictions in Didion’s heart. The prose transfers them from hers to mine." I feel this transfer, too, when I read a story like A Three Dog Life, or Jeanette Walls’ The Glass Castle, or a story like Amy Bloom’s Silver Water. These are the authors’ particular stories, but the pain of loss, the reverberating anxiety of chaos, the unresolvable aspects of madness and/or futility—these aren't singular moments. Most of us have lived one or all of these challenges, and empathy proverbially sets us apart from lizards. When they are artfully told, we hear others’ stories, and through their catharses or at least resolutions, we bond—nodding our heads, or wiping our tears, or jamming up the volume on that transgressive song we play when we’re in agony.
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