July 23 is Nancy Scott’s birthday, and we have a tradition of general silliness around birthdays. This year, we read several chapters from Lita Kurth’s small but mighty memoir book, Writing Memoir in Flashes: Creative Ways to Tell Your True Stories, One Memory at a Time.
We recommend Writing Memoir in Flashes to writers who struggle with getting started. Nancy writes a lot of short essays and has contemplated what it would take to write a longer memoir. Many of the techniques in the books are tricks we both already use.
As a writer, do you recognize the inspiration in your everyday life? This book will certainly help you tap it if you are prone to writer’s block.
Nan and I found the exploration of forms most interesting. Lita offers one of her own abecedarians, suggests use of a hierarchical list to order your thoughts, playing with homophones and definitions of words, and our potential new favorite: the dekaaz.
Lita cites author and musician Rachel Bagby as the creator of this form, basically mini haikus, meant to be spoken. Each stanza has ten syllables: first line two syllables, then second line has three, and the final line five. The build provides a fun rhythm when spoken aloud.
Lita’s chapters present practical topics from how to order your flash memoir into a collection, addressing overwriting and underwriting, and creating tension with proper pacing (something memoir writers often forget is necessary).
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