Writing Creative Nonfiction Book

It took me longer than I'd hoped, but I finally finished the lengthy Writing Creative Nonfiction collection. The book is divided into two sections: essays dedicated to the craft of writing, and examples of essays and short stories written by authors who personify these skills. The mix of inspiration and instruction make this a good resource for new MFA students (like myself).

It was fascinating to see Brenda Miller's take on the braided essay in A Braided Heart: Shaping the Lyric Essay. In it she delves into the two forms I was unfamiliar with before entering the program'braided and lyric. Reading her essay, I felt like one of her writing students, watching with trepidation as she brought the challah out on the table. By writing the instructional essay in braided form, moving through examples of how it works and explanations to why she loves it (all knit around the metaphorical braided bread), you are able to get a strong sense of why and how this works. At the beginning she notes, "As a child, I knew only that braided bread simply tasted better than ordinary bread, the way texture will often affect flavor, the way presentation and form can sometimes offer sustenance in itself" (Miller 15). The style allows writers to segment their stories and experiences with ribbons of detail that would be lost in traditional, linear styles. In the braided essay, Miller is able to work in everything from her teaching experiences to a recipe for challah. As she states, "Sometimes your peripheral vision catches the most important details" (Miller 18). One of her actual braided essays appears in the second half of the book, titled Basha Leah. The story weaves together her memories of growing up Jewish alongside a trip to Catholic South America. The details, triggered along in a trail of sudden glimpses, show us her interpretation of her own spirituality through the peripheral.

I found Laura Wexler's Saying Goodbye to "Once Upon a Time," or Implementing Postmodernism in Creative Nonfiction particularly interesting in its similarities to one of the June residency's craft talks. Wexler describes her experience attempting to gather information and write about a mid-20th century lynching incident, in a starkly similar vein as Jennifer Miller. Wexler accepts that she is never going to know the "true story" by indisputable, hard fact. Her take is that this does not exist. Each witness has their own memory and take, and she notes that "The bedrock principle of postmodernism is subjectivity, the idea that the world looks different depending on where you stand" (Wexler 26). In the postmodern spirit, she argues that this ambulation of the facts should not discourage writers from tackling the subjects. It just presents a new challenge to the writer, one that involves gathering a wide variety of interpretations and opinions and then sorting them out using one's own life experiences and intuitions to arrive at a final truth or conclusion. "The stories in whith truth seems to purposely hide in the shadows'can be written as nonfiction by focusing as much on interpretation as event. In fact, it is these very stories that most need to be written as nonfiction" (Wexler 29). Hidden, sparse stories, such as Jennifer Miller's lynching research and Eric Schmidt's research on a German WWII pilot, are just such stories. Facts and citations are sparse. The memories live on in shadows'dying memories, family tales, hidden secrets. For an author to uncover, reveal and ponder over these, taking the reader into the search, what could be more exciting? Certainly not textbook facts.

A few of the essays, particularly those focusing on preparing for traveling into war zones and exotic tropical countries, were slightly less applicable to me. I know that life is an unpredictable journey, but unless there is some extreme upheaval in my relationship, living and professional situations, I don't see myself ever needing a malaria shot to research my writing. Still, it's good to know that others are making these journeys, and it makes Writing Creative Nonfiction a very well-rounded manual for nonfiction writers of all kinds. I would recommend its place on any of our bookshelves, and I think I'll find myself referring back to it often.