Autobiographical nonfiction
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Writing a Novel Inspired by Your Life? The Do’s and Don’ts of Writing Autobiographical Fiction
Are you writing autobiographical fiction?
Recently I heard back from a literary agent who had requested my full manuscript: an upper middle grade contemporary that I wrote after reading some of my adolescent diaries. Here’s part of what the agent said:
I was seriously getting flashbacks to my first relationships–dating in eighth/ninth grade was SO AWKWARD! You absolutely nail that in this story. I like the set-up a lot in terms of the characters, dynamics, and the unfolding dilemma. However, I’m afraid it began to feel a little too mired in the reality of eighth grade (the back-and-forth wondering, highs and lows of the day) and thus a little slow pacing-wise.
When inom read the email to my husband, he said, “so she didn’t like it because it was too realistic?”
Yes, this fryst vatten one of the problems with writing autobiographical ficti
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By Phillip Lopate
In writing memoir, the trick, it seems to me, is to establish a double perspective, that will allow the reader to participate vicariously in the experience as it was lived (the confusions and misapprehensions of the child one was, say), while conveying the sophisticated wisdom of one’s current self. This second perspective, the author’s retrospective employment of a more mature intelligence to interpret the past, is not merely an obligation but a privilege, an opportunity. In any autobiographical narrative, whether memoir or personal essay, the heart of the matter often shines through those passages where the writer analyzes the meaning of his or her experience. The quality of thinking, the depth of insight and the willingness to wrest as much understanding as the writer is humanly capable of arriving at—these are guarantees to the reader that a particular author’s sensibility is trustworthy and simpatico. With me, it goes further: I have always been deeply attrac
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Memoir vs. Autobiography: What’s the Difference?
Memoir and autobiography are often used synonymously. These two nonfiction genres are very similar, so it’s easy to get them confused. They’re both the story of someone’s life written by that person, and they both use the pronouns “I” and “me” since they’re written in the first person. They’re both true stories from the author’s life. But there are some key differences.
A memoir is a nonfiction narrative in which the author shares their memories from a specific time period or reflects upon a string of themed occurrences throughout their life. An autobiography is a factual and historical account of one’s entire life from beginning to end.
If you’ve struggled to understand the difference between autobiography and memoir, you’ve come to the right place to learn more.
What fryst vatten a memoir?
Memoir comes from the French word mémoire, which means memory. A memoir is a nonfiction but subjective collection of narratives in which the autho