Where is the line between story and memory? Our Year of the Novel blogger, Caro, has some thoughts…
Nowadays, the years fly by. But for a seven year old, a year represents a substantial portion of life, or at least life-so-far. So when I arrived at a new primary school a year after most of the other students, it became clear I’d missed a lot. Two students were already married (a brief peck on the cheek had taken place in the corner of the playground and afterwards everyone present had celebrated with lamingtons), the class had gained – and lost – a pet bird (who met with a traumatic and public end) and there had been two high-profile instances of pant-wetting.
My new friends told me these stories, over and over, until they became part of the mythology of the playground. Sometimes the storyteller would forget that I wasn’t there that year and include me in their account anyway. After a while, I knew the stories so well they became almost my own – I still think about them as part of my narrative. They’re like adopted memories.
Now, I’m writing about a character who is unable to forget, and as part of this process I need to create a lifetime of memories for someone else. It’s a process that keeps taking me back to that arrival at a new school and the way the class shared their collective recollection of events with me. As I’m writing Nick’s history, little elements of my own experience invariably creep in, intertwine with his. Memory is unreliable at the best of times and, just like all those years ago, it’s becoming harder and harder to tell the difference between which stories are mine. Which I’ve appropriated. And which I’ve loaned to someone else.
It makes me wonder: Is it possible to write without investing yourself and your experiences in your stories? Feel free to comment – I’d love to know what you think!
3 comments ↓
The science of memory (or what I read of it in New Scientist) is currently indicating what some of us feel – memories are constructs that bear, at best, only a passing resemblance to the reality of events and emotions of a shared past. And at any given moment we’re reviewing and editing these constructs as pieces of what we call ‘me’. Like the crumbling mud houses of Mali, memories fall off and are refashioned in their likeness.
When I look at my memory, I can only wonder how much is construct and how much is ‘true’.
Because I write soap opera, I talk to actors occasionally, and I’ve heard it said more than once that if their character were a real person, remembering more than six months in the past – the betrayals, the medical crises, the relationships, the car crashes, etc – would drive them insane.
Perhaps in some ways that also applies to us. Too much memory would bury us.
It probably is possible to write without investing yourself and your experiences in your stories, but it would be difficult. On the other hand, writing what you know tends to be beneficial; you’d be better at it than writing what you DON’T know.
Hi Ben,
Thanks for the comment – it’s a really interesting perspective. I’ve also seen some research that suggests that the more we think about a particular memory, the less accurate it is. The process of remembering seems to alter and stylise our account of events.
And Bonnee,
You’re right, there’s an authenticity to at least beginning with what we know (though I think most writers take a lot of licence with it!).
Thanks for the comments!
Caro
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