How To Read My Memoirs

After contemplating the purpose of a memoir several things came to mind. I believe it can serve to be cathartic for the writer as they can be set free by working through certain events in their life. Furthermore, and perhaps more importantly, I think a memoir can serve as a way to for the writer to tell their story in a vivid way that allows the readers to feel like they are living the experience and perhaps to learn a valuable lesson from their story. Therefore, I chose to analyze two memoirs they were Superman and Me by Sherman Alexie and “Salvation” by Langston Hughes. I concentrated on trying to determine the purpose of each piece in order to indicate what pivotal aspects were employed that either helped or hindered them in achieving that purpose.

I’m sure many have shared stories of their high school experiences and can relate when I say those four years have taught me many lessons. During this time, I’d come face to face with the fraudulent friendships, temporary romances, and other high school dramas that my parents once warned me about—those of which I simply brushed off as myths. It wasn’t the 90’s anymore— times have changed and people are different—or at least, that’s what I thought.

William Zinsser is the person that wrote “How To Write A Memoir ”. William Zinsser gave us some advice to write a memoir. These specific advices are “Be Yourself”,” Speak Freely”, and “Think Small”. In Bad Boy, Walter Dean Myer memoir uses Zinsser advice but not in a exact way Zinsser wrote his memoir. Zinsser give us suggestions such as “Be Yourself” , ”It Your Story”, and “Think Small”.

In “How to Write a Memoir” William Zinsser gives very detailed and important advice to writers interested in writing a memoir. He gives the specific advice of “Be yourself,” “Speak Freely,” and “Think Small” (Zinsser, 2, 4, 6). These tips advise writers to not only think about what they want to say in their story but also how they want to tell their story. Many memoir authors choose to follow this advice and write their story using these points, but many do not. In the memoir “A Summer Life”, Gary Soto follows Zinsser’s writing advice through his use of writing from the point of view of a young child, speaking freely about his early life events, and writing about his life in small structure chapters.

Zinsser writes in his essay being the protagonist of one's story "... means leaving out of your memoir many people who don't need to be there. Like siblings." Not following this specific piece of advice is an interesting choice because the whole point of a memoir is that it is about the author, but by occasionally telling stories about the other members of his family like siblings or parents he family strengthens the story. Even though it is discouraged in "How to Write a Memoir" adding side details and backstories makes Roald Dahl's memoir

In Zinsser’s “How to Write a Memoir” he gives you three pieces of advice, be yourself, speak freely, and think small. I’m going to be comparing these three pieces of advice to my memoir I’ve read ”Guts”. I will be writing at least 5 paragraphs minimum for my essay. Now that I told you what I’m going to be doing, lets get right to it!

When Chris Crutcher decides to use imagery it is often very detailed. He takes the time to describe what these characters are seeing and feeling. Chris wants to make sure that the readers can see every situation, feel the weight of every decision, and feel the pain of the characters. Imagery is a very helpful tool to help Chris’ ideas really jump off the page and into your head. Some of these scenes of imagery include a little girl scrubbing off her skin using a brillo pad, and a character's father

In the reading, “Writing About Yourself: The Memoir” by William Zinsser, the author uses organization, examples, and direct advice to develop the purpose and message of the selection. The message of this piece is that writing about oneself and delving into what has made the author who they are gives the writing individuality and distinction. Like the message, the purpose is to encourage writers to write about themselves and what has shaped them without hesitation. To begin with, the author uses a pattern of organization where he introduces an excerpt of a memoir by stating a quality that makes this memoir exemplary. After the excerpt, he will further comment on what makes this memoir memorable for him. For example, the author states, “One secret of the art [the memoir] is detail… a sound or smell—as long as it played a

The author uses imagery to interest the reader in her story that may seem mundane without the imagery. An example of this happening is when Jeannette is going to her new school in Welch it was her first day and the teacher picks on her because she did not have to give the school her records to her not having them as that is happening a tall girl stabs her out of nowhere“I felt something sharp and painful between my shoulder blades and turned around. The tall black girl with the almond eyes was sitting at the desk behind me.

For this assignment we were asked to write a memoir about a significant event in our life. We were graded on our ability to create an engaging opening, write a powerful storyline with a complex self-awareness, and create a piece with a clear beginning, middle, and end. It was expected that we followed MLA format and at least two pages long. For my memoir I wrote about a time I injured myself. I think the main purpose of the assignment was to get us to think about how events in our life impacted who we are today. It was also meant to encourage us to analyze how we reacted to a certain situation and why we reacted in the way we did. Overall it was meant to help us analyze who we are as a person and better understand how we came to be that

I chose my memoir for AP English Language and Composition as my best piece because it’s received a ninety percent and is the written work I’m most proud of. The reader should expect to find information about me that one wouldn’t know by simply looking at me. One will find how overcoming my own challenges and one that was thrown at me made the person I am today. One would discover my passion and determination to pursue a career in family law. The impressions I hope the reader gains about myself after viewing this piece is that I am a methodical writer as well as a psychological person who tends to hide it.

In my English 1010 class, I have learned to do a number of things through writing essays. I have written a Literacy Narrative, a Discourse Community Analysis, and a Writing Research essay. Firstly, I have learned to identify how an author’s purpose, audience, genre, and context determine effective writing. The purpose of the literacy narrative was to help me understand myself better as a writer (Jones 1). My teacher was the intended audience of the narrative. The genre of the narrative was non-fiction by cause of it being about my experience as a writer. The context of writing made my writing more interesting and more effective. Knowing those elements helps you to compose writing that is more effective due to you needing to know what you need to write about and who is receiving your writing. I displayed these skills by going into detail about my experiences with reading and writing through my life. As shown in the following sentence from my literacy narrative I shared how fun and exciting it was when my second-grade class received the opportunity to write a book, A Book of Future Astronauts, “Everyone in the class was truly excited to be writing our own book,” (Writing is Good).

“How does Mom do this so easily?” I thought, flipping the pages of a thin children’s book. When my mother read to me, it seemed so smooth, so effortless. But these scribbles surrounding the brightly colored pictures meant nothing to me I knew that the letters my teacher had flashed before the class should arrange into these words, but I could not recall the symbols. As the rest of the class sounded out the letters, forming words, then sentences, it seemed my mind could not make the connection Anguished, I eavesdropped on another child reading aloud from the same sentence and memorized it. When the teacher came by, I recited the sentence perfectly, but I still could mot make sense of the sea of lines floating on the page. I continued this way for several weeks. I managed to memorize the contents of the class’s repertoire of beginning reader’s books, without reading the words. Every time it was read aloud, I would frantically try to remember what had been said.

Reading and doing the assignments for The Help by Kathryn Stockett has helped prepare me tremendously for going back to school and English class. Not only was the book extremely enjoyable and interesting but the assignment was actually quite fun. I chose to create a 20 song playlist and CD cover as if the book was a movie. Doing the assignments definitely helped me get back into the swing of reading, writing and workshopping some of my problem areas in writing. Most of all doing all the work on my own has helped learn to identify and adjust my writing problems without having to rely upon someone else's help.

An autobiography is a story of your own life. Even if you think you don’t have much to include in your memoir, you can still make it quite interesting.