Found a great article on memoir writing

Or rather my mother did. So I snaffled it and photocopied it. Here's a quote:

Style is one way to corral unruly memories and, at the same time, acknowledge that the most interesting thing about them may be that they do not cohere. In the 20th century, Marcel Proust provides the model for this way of writing an autobiography, so that many of the best memoirs read as much like modernist novels as acts of self-revelation. Nabokov's Speak, Memory is among his most intricately patterned and deceptive books. Its motifs recur with exquisite tact and timing; a particular slant of summer light, a child holding his father's hand in the park. But despite its perfection, the pattern fails to reconcile the author's idyllic Russian childhood and his exiled adult self. Or take Roland Barthes's peculiar critical study of his own life and career, entitled Roland Barthes, in which he reflects on fragments of his past: family photographs, medical records from his time in a TB sanatorium, lists of his likes and dislikes. 'It must all be considered,' he writes, 'as if spoken by a character in a novel.'

'In Memoriam' by Brian Dillon, in 1000 Books to Change Your Life, Time Out.

Today - just those phrases - a particular slant of summer light, a child holding his father's hand in the park - made me tumble back to some of my first memories.

Tell me a story - who held your hand in sunlight? How old were you? Where were you? What were you wearing? What were you called and who called you? How did you feel?

500 - 1000 words - post your stories as doc attachments to:
catherinebATgippstafeDOTvicDOTeduDOTau
Best entry wins a small prize! (This will not be money, don't get too excited!)
This competition is open to all blog readers, not just gippstafe students. Make sure your entry is your own original work, has your name and address on it and does not exceed the word limit. Closing date: 25th March 2010. Good luck everyone!style="font-weight:bold;">

A new year begins -

Well, okay - we've had the New Year and the Chinese New Year and now it's the Teaching New Year - I think some celebration should mark this beginning - fireworks? champagne? No? Writing resolutions! Yes!

A number of students, a great number of students, have listed procrastination as one of the bad habits they have, time to write as something they lack - or will to write when there is a little time. What are ways to combat these very much self-inflicted but nonetheless real problems all of us grapple with?

Let's start with procrastination. There's a great tendency among all the writers I know to do anything other than the writing itself. We find ourselves making pickles, ironing the sheets and tea towels or cleaning the bath with a toothbrush - anything rather than sit down to a day's writing work. Deadlines speed some people up, but paralyse others.

One way I've found useful in stalling my habit of procrastination is to actually reward myself when I sit down to write. So, for example, I'll select a stack of cds to listen to - but only when I'm sitting at my desk writing. That can be incentive enough some days.

Timing your writing to coincide with the completion of a different task or event can work, too - I used to write while my children, then toddlers, watched Playschool. To this day, the music from Playschool makes my fingers twitch! For a long time I wrote every day after I walked the dogs - and that produced a definite start time for me. It was a good habit to form because the act of walking the dogs, allowed me to do a lot of pre-writing thinking and that meant that by the time I arrived home, I already had ideas about what I wanted to write.

Sometimes it's just simply making writing the first thing you do every day. Julia Cameron recommends this in her book, The Artist's Way - she calls this writing 'morning pages'. This can be difficult, particularly if you have small children, but the extra effort can reap benefits.

If it's simply too hard to write every day, you can try designating a particular day of the week your writing day - many people teaching within Professional Writing and Editing try to do this - it may seem hard to stick to this, particularly if you're working or parenting full-time, but to carve out even a regular afternoon a week is something. Then, for the rest of the week, you can make quick notes, jottings that will keep you on track when your writing day comes around.

It can help to have a writing buddy - you can make a writing date. Go somewhere together to write - a cafe, gallery or a park. You don't even need to share your writing at the end, if you don't choose to - though sometimes having someone's instant feedback can be gratifying.

If you live somewhere more remote, you could make an online writing buddy - maybe someone from this course. At the end of a writing session, you simply email your writing buddy - a message could be as short as 'I've done it! How about you?'

Creating a writing date for yourself can also be useful - again, this need not be anywhere special - sitting down in a park for half an hour, or a food hall, or even on a train, providing you use that time to write and observe can present you with interesting and unusual material - sometimes simply because you're out of your normal place of working. Local libraries often have desks for people to work on - and some (this could be a trap!) even offer wifi.

Try to treat your writing time as a joyful job. Don't answer the phone, if you can avoid it. Don't answer emails. Don't log onto the TAFE blackboard. Tell children, partners, parents and friends that you will be available only after you've done your work. Usually people are pretty good about this, particularly if you give them an actual time you'll be finished. Some writers I know offer visual clues to their families - they wear industrial earmuffs or work behind a closed door with a Keep Out sign.

All these might sound difficult but what you need to remember is that you won't ever be a writer without writing! So - writing resolutions, anyone?

I'm planning to work on short material this semester - just play around with some ideas I have, revise some material as well. My writing life will be curtailed by the hours I'm teaching but I'm carving two regular writing times out of my teaching week - I'm putting aside Thursday afternoons and Fridays for writing - or at least a part of each of these days. I'm also planning a regular artist's date with myself - whether that's catching up with fellow writers or visiting the gallery or a market - all with my notebook in hand.

Write on!