“I want to share my story, and I want to know yours. I believe with all my heart that sharing our stories,… — Anna White Copy Share Image
I think some of the best sex writing is going to come from the unexpected sources, not the same old same old.… — Rachel Kramer Bussel Copy Share Image
Oh, my God. What if you wake up some day, and you're 65 or 75, and you never got your novel or… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
Though I consider The Chronology of Water to be an anti-memoir for very precise reasons, it is an art form, and thus… — Lidia Yuknavitch Copy Share Image
I'd say, [writing memoir] not so much a model, but maybe to provide an insight, here or there, to help somebody come… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
“As a survivor of sibling abuse, the toxic shame is not for the survivor to carry. You didn’t do anything wrong. You… — Dana Arcuri CTRC Copy Share Image
The other reason I didn't want to fictionalize it is because one of the main points of publishing a memoir in nonfiction… — Melissa Febos Copy Share Image
“Darkness fell, revealing a sparkling night sky so beautiful that we decided to sleep out under the stars. At gray dawn, Phyllis… — William Packer Copy Share Image
“It's the same with the wound in our hearts. We need to give them our attention so that they can heal. Otherwise… — James R. Doty Copy Share Image
If anything, I've found nonfiction a little easier. You don't have to make anything up. Of course, that's the inherent difficulty as… — Debra Dean Copy Share Image
“Writing is mental exercise and the preeminent method to train the mind to achieve a desirable state of mental quietude. Meditative writing,… — Kilroy J. Oldster Copy Share Image
“I have never experienced writers block and I've written every day since June 1972. But I have experienced the need to get… — Jan Marquart Copy Share Image
Going from memoir to fiction was fantastic. I had been afraid to move away from memoir; I'd written some novel drafts, but… — Janice Erlbaum Copy Share Image
“Suddenly life was good, even glamorous. We were poor but didn’t know it, or maybe we did know, but we didn’t care,… — Katie Hafner Copy Share Image
I have studied the enemy all my life. I have read the memoirs of his generals and his leaders. I have even… — George S. Patton Copy Share Image
“The quality of any author’s effort at personal writing and thematic commentary hinges upon the author’s intrinsic limitations, personal vantage point, and… — Kilroy J. Oldster Copy Share Image
I review books as a day job, and through the years I've come to view the contemporary memoir as, almost always, a… — Walter Kirn Copy Share Image
“Learning that I could forgive my father, while realizing I did not have to let the aspects that I found unhealthy, disrespectful,… — Neal Winsomer Copy Share Image
“There is a place for what my heart tells me about you, and there is no shame or guilt in it. God… — Mark Fiore Copy Share Image
A serious life, by definition, is a life one reflects on, a life one tries to make sense of and bear witness… — Vivian Gornick Copy Share Image
“Two unwritten rules of peacekeeping existed. You’d expect it would be easy to keep two rules, but I broke the first one.… — Tammy Pemper Copy Share Image
“You have to study and learn so that you can make up your own mind. Stock your mind, stock your mind. It… — Frank McCourt Copy Share Image
The current memoir craze has fostered the belief that confession is therapeutic, that therapy is redemptive and that redemption equals art, and… — Michiko Kakutani Copy Share Image
“Unlike uplifting light fiction, narrative nonfiction’s trammeled territory provides no safe room where an unnerved writer can banish their unpleasant memories. Narrative… — Kilroy J. Oldster Copy Share Image
“Whether or not you employ humor in dealing with difficult subjects, the tone of the writing is of the utmost importance. Personally,… — Judith Barrington Copy Share Image
If you're writing a book where you want to make a positive truth claim, then you should absolutely call it nonfiction or… — Elif Batuman Copy Share Image
“Most German perpetrators were never punished or rewarded for their behavior, but they had learned something about themselves. They know what they… — Fern Schumer Chapman Copy Share Image
A fine memoir is to a fine novel as a well-wrought blanket is to a fancifully embroidered patchwork quilt. The memoir, a… — Julia Glass Copy Share Image
“...Having felt the piercing gash of grief and lived through it, having loved to the brink of brokenness, and having learned the… — Eldonna Edwards Copy Share Image
The parts in which I elaborated on the sexual life of the doctor herself, the personal life, her relation with men [in… — Nawal El Saadawi Copy Share Image
The memoir industry is, what's the word? Under regulated. I think it needs to be pruned. If there are too many books… — Arthur Phillips Copy Share Image
On a spectrum of literary productions, memoir is just another form. If the person doing the reviewing or critiquing was ill-educated about… — Lidia Yuknavitch Copy Share Image
Here I come to one of the memoir writer's difficulties -- one of the reasons why, though I read so many, so… — Virginia Woolf Copy Share Image
“The lawyer asked us to sit down. He was holding a copy of the will in his hands. I sat nearest him.… — Christina Crawford Copy Share Image
At its best, fiction cultivates fantasy and compassion; at its worst, memoir provokes schadenfreude and prurience. The ugly truth, I fear, is… — Julia Glass Copy Share Image
It [the memoir "In The Body of the World"] wrote me. I joke about it, but this book was so unusual. It… — Eve Ensler Copy Share Image
“Mr. Schlubb, the pear-shaped PE teacher, sent us all out to run half a dozen laps around a preposterously enormous cinder track.… — Bill Bryson Copy Share Image
“The move away from writing poetry was gradual. It was a gentle slope into a muddy pond; it was a collection of… — Angela Doll Carlson Copy Share Image
“But then we did not think ever of ourselves as poor. We did not accept it. We thought we were superior people… — Ernest Hemingway Copy Share Image
“There are lots of real reasons to decide to leave something or someone, but there are lots of other reasons that are… — Anna White Copy Share Image
![“I'd say, [writing memoir] not so much a model, but maybe to provide an insight, here or there, to help somebody come to terms with the dark corners of their own soul, to come to terms with the undecided, their own sense of self, and maybe help develop a capacity to love - to love wisdom, love…” quote by Cornel West](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/22d/cornel-west-708_capacity_i-d-say-writing-memoir-not-so-much-a-mod_376670.jpg)
![“The parts in which I elaborated on the sexual life of the doctor herself, the personal life, her relation with men [in Memoirs of a Woman Doctor]. All this. They left only some very, very minute parts. And also the political, the political element in it. So in a way, they cut pieces that to my…” quote by Nawal El Saadawi](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/b5d/nawal-el-saadawi-4167_cutting_the-parts-in-which-i-elaborated-on-the-s_422916.jpg)
![“It [the memoir "In The Body of the World"] wrote me. I joke about it, but this book was so unusual. It just started to come out. I really feel like it came straight from my body. I think it was both an expression of what I had gone through, but also it just felt like everything had come together…” quote by Eve Ensler](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7b7/eve-ensler-1402_body_it-the-memoir-in-the-body-of-the-world-w_1456030.jpg)
