Going Back to Books: Part II

Jane Austen's desk in her Cottage in Chawton, Hampshire
where she lived for eight years,
and worked on 'Emma', 'Persuasion' & 'Mansfield Park'
c. 1809

Chawton Cottage was a household of ladies - Mrs Austen, her daughters and their friend Martha Lloyd - all taking part in the work of the house and garden. But Jane was allowed private time. Having no room of her own, she established herself near the little-used front door, and here "she wrote upon small sheets of paper which could easily be put away, or covered with a piece of blotting paper". A creaking swing door gave her warning when anyone was coming, and she refused to have the creak remedied.[Source]

I am happy to say that I have a few of Jane Austen's book:

Pride and Prejudice
Sense and Sensibility
and Emma

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Below are my recent purchases (within the past three or four months).

I haven't read all of them (actually the majority). Perhaps I am waiting to win the lottery to go to some island repose where all I do is read (and contemplate - the important and often neglected part that goes with reading).

Reading is a tough call these days. The home television is on all the time (imagine trying to read with a CNN report with "HILLARY.....TRUMP.....SYRIA....!!!!" interjecting, or with The Price is Right's audience screaming its enthusiasm.

I often wonder how Jane Austen wrote her books in the midst of the bustle of family life. But in her time, the sounds of the home were the clutter of her mother and sisters taking care of the home - preparing meals, sweeping and dusting, writing notes to friends and neighbors. And "talking" didn't come from some gadget but through quiet conversations with family members and visitors. The radio or the gramophone were not invented yet (or available for public use) so music and discourse were presented during evening socials by family members and guests. Sound had its time and place, and its (reduced) volume. There was none of that 24-hour schedule we have for everything now.

The modern world is making us more stupid, more narcissistic and more callous. It is a capitulation to unGodly schedules and impulses. It is the grip of the Devil.

Still, I get a couple of hours in the late afternoon and now I have started to get up at 5am (4:45) where I have my morning coffee and a chapter to get through. Of course this competes with my writing time, so I guard these hours jealously.

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Here is my current list of books, in no particular order:

- Words Overflown By Stars: Creative Writing Instruction and Insight From the Vermont College of Fine Arts M.F.A. Program: Edited by David Jauss

- Religion and the Rise of Western Culture: The Classic Study of Medieval Civilization: Christopher Dawson

- The B Side: The Death of Tin Pan Alley and the Rebirth of the Great American Song: Ben Yagoda

- Who is that Man? In Search of the Real Bob Dylan: David Dalton

- Someday, Someday, Maybe: Lauren Graham

- Talking as Fast as I Can: From Gilmore Girls to Gilmore Girls (and Everything in Between): Lauren Graham

- Sunshne Sketches of a Little Town: Stephen Leacock

- Little House on the Prairie: Laura Ingalls Wilder

- A Good Day's Work: In Pursuit of a Disappearing Canada: John DeMont

- The Moment: Wild, Poignant, Life-Changing Stories form 125 Writers and Artists - Famous and Obscure: Edited by Larry Smith

- Designs for a Happy Home: Matthew Reynolds

- Scent of Triumph: A Novel of Perfume and Passion : Jan Moran

- Sydney and Violet: Their Life with T.S. Eliot, Proust, Joyce, and the Excruciatingly Irascible Wyndham Lewis: Stephen Kladman

And the book that started this flurry of purchases:

- How to Write a Memoir in 30 Days: Step-by-Step instructions for Creating and Publishing Your Personal Story: Roberta Temes, PhD

The "30 days" are long gone but I found these two bits of wisdom which have shaped my "drafts" ever since I got this book:

A memoir is not an autobiography. An autobiography is strictly factual and chronologically covers your life from birth until today. It is accurate and full of facts and explanations. An autobiography states facts, whereas a memoir describes your reactions to those facts. For example, an autobiography might discuss social and political ideas of the times, but your memoir would discuss your emotional responses to those ideas. Your autobiography s a photograph a picture, showing precise detail. Your memoir, on the other hand, is an impressionistic painting - a canvass conveying a general impressions using free brushstrokes to create a general feeling.

My next question of course was: Should I write a work of fiction as had Lauren Graham before she delved into her memories? Or as this author says was the source of many novels:

The Self as Object in Modernist Fiction: James, Joyce, Hemingway (but am NOT a "Modernist"!)

I like the idea of a memoir. Afterall, that is what my blogs have been in some way: a record of the things I saw, observed, and was attracted to, not necessarily on an intellectual level but often on a visceral one.

Perhaps I should simply publish my blogs!!! (There are many online advisors out there showing just how to do that!).

Another important advice I got from Dr. Temes was to find a category for the memoir:

Memoirs fall into different categories. Perhaps you already know in what category your memoir belongs. It might be:

(and here is a list including - a relationship memoir, an animal memoir(?), an illness memoir - etc..)

I think mine fits well with: A Call to Action Memoir. After all, I have called my blog Reclaiming Beauty: Saving Our Western Civilization.

One final insight from Dr. Temes inadvertently showed me this:

A memoir is not a confessional! Everyone has some harrowing story to tell (some much worse than others) but I really don't think people like to read some psychologically difficult or traumatic premise of anyone's life. It is now the norm or the trend to find such kinds of memories publicly discussed. We are in the era of Oprah after all. Bookstores will happily cater to such clientele with these quick-read books to fill their shelves (as opposed to say a Hemingway) and publishers will be glad of their busy schedules with "writers" seeking their services (they charge steep prices too!). But how lasting, how important and how insightful are such "memoirs?" What do they really have to say?

So this Dr. Temes discouraged me from this personalized confessional and challenged me to write something "bigger" than myself!

It is all coming together!