Five Quotes from The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr that Make Everything Better
I’ve been re-reading The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr (again), so I offer five quotes from this book that make everything better, at least for me. Hopefully her words below will make everything better for you, too.
Mary Karr on Anger and Resentment
“Sometimes I pray to see people I’m angry at or resentful of as God sees them, which heals both page and heart.”
Mary Karr on Writing the Truth
“You cut a contract early on to offer up the deepest perceptions you can muster without preening and posturing. Other writers may work otherwise, but every great memoirist I ever talked to sounded cursed to face up to real events. That’s just the nature of the enterprise. Truth works a trip wire that permits the book to explode into being.”
Mary Karr on Emotional Stakes
“Unless you confess your own emotional stakes in a project, why should a reader have any? A writer sets personal reasons for the text at hand, and her struggling psyche fuels the tale.”
Mary Karr on Writing the Real Self
“Writing the real self seldom seems original enough when you first happen on it. In fact, usually it growls like a beast and stinks of something rotten. Age and practice help you to rout out vanities after you’ve ruined perfectly good paper setting them down, but you can’t keep them from clotting up early drafts.”
Mary Karr on Decent Writing Advice
“In fact, after a lifetime of hounding authors for advice, I’ve heard three truths from every mouth: (1) Writing is painful—it’s “fun” only for novices, the very young, and hacks; (2) other than a few instances of luck, good work only comes through revision; (3) the best revisers often have reading habits that stretch back before the current age, which lends them a sense of history and raises their standards for quality.”
Spiritual Direction for Writers™ provides nourishing co-writing sessions, retreats, courses, Solo Writing Retreat Guides, and more for writers from writer and spiritual director for writers @charlottedonlon and our @spiritualdirectionforwriters partners. We help you have the writing life you want.