Literary Exploration discussion

Hello everyone!

I have been on quite a big memoir kick lately and was wondering how else can't resist the pull of a well-written memoir - and if anyone has any recommendations on their favorite ones?

I like humorous ones, deep ones, unconventional ones..there basically is not an autobiography I would not read. I am not drawn to biographies as much though.. so maybe you could change my mind? ;)

Memoirs I've Read Recently:
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Lucky
First Person Plural: My Life as a Multiple
Undress Me in the Temple of Heaven

=)

For me to like a memoir/biography I have to be interested in the person it is about. No matter how well written it is, or interesting I just can't get into them.

The best ones I've read were Nerd Do Well (Simon Pegg), Moab Is My Washpot and The Fry Chronicles (Stephen Fry), The Complete Maus, Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly (Anthony Bourdain), Boy: Tales of Childhood and Going Solo (Roald Dahl) and The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid (Bill Bryson).

I've been trying to expand my horizon and read all the ones I can get my hands on. That being said, I have abandoned a few memoirs where I just couldn't connect with the person or subject. (IE: To Hell with All That: Loving and Loathing Our Inner Housewife by Caitlin Flanagan & The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion, most recently)

I have the Fry, Bryson and Dahl books on my shelf to read this year, as a matter of fact! And I really like Simon Pegg so I will have to check out his book. Thanks Kim!

I just finished My Family and Other Animals which was really funny. It's written by Gerald Durrell, younger brother of Lawrence Durrell set during the time the family lived on Corfu before the war.

I liked Angela's Ashes. Some have said they thought it depressing, but I found it surprisingly uplifting at many points, and McCourt has such a good sense of humor.

Moving back from the current day, I've always loved The Story of San Michele, which is a series of anecdotes from the life of a fashionable doctor in the late 19th century. Even more fascinating when you read up on the author and see what's been left out - he'd clearly rather be talking about the murderers and prostitutes and rural laplanders he's known than about the vast array of celebrities he was friends with. And he denies the book is his 'memoirs', and although he seems to be completely and engagingly open and honest with the reader, he left out some minor, tiny little details, like being married two times and having had children. In fact, he married a British woman, raised his children in Britain, and became a British citizen, but all this is hardly mentioned. And he doesn't talk about the things he wrote about in his other, shorter works, such as climbing Mont Blanc, or working in an ambulance corps during WWI.
It's also clear that he's NOT an author (is rather scathing about them, actually), and so there's a quite workmanlike, rough-hewn quality about things quite often (in particular, a refusal to use semicolons that leads to a lot of run-on sentences).
And you can't necessarily trust him. And he doesn't always come across in a very positive light - but partly because he seems to be trying to make himself look bad on purpose. While making himself look good - or vice versa, it's not clear.

The good things about the book are:
a) although he's not a writer, he does have a natural feel for a sentence, and there are some really beautiful lines here and there
b) he considers himself a sort of psychologist, and gives his characters (including himself) a great psychological... well, not depth exactly, but precision. They feel like real people. Which they mostly were, of course
c) it's a fascinating exhibition of a time-period that's almost the same as ours, yet startingly different in some ways
d) it does a good job of combining the prosaic and the realistic with a soul of lush heightened-colour romanticism
e) in places it's veers into magic-realism, decades before the genre was invented


Two further caveats, however:
1. Don't read the first chapter and put it down. The first chapter is a sort of soft-focus fantasy (he visits the island of Capri and is enchanted by it, and buying a ruined house there ('San Michele') becomes his life's ambition), very lushly and fluffily written, with a sprinkling of untranslated italian. Don't worry - it'll always be a Victorian style of writing because that's what he wrote, but the rest of the book is a lot more down-to-earth and readable than the first chapter!
2. Due to the content (some tear-jerking sections - lots of cholera and diphtheria and earthquakes and poverty and abortions and euthanasia and rabies and so forth) and the style, it's a bit of a heavy book, I've found. Fortunately, the anecdotal structure means it's perfect to be read chapter-at-a-time.

Plus, you can't go too wrong with one of the best-selling non-fiction books of the 20th century, can you?

Speak, Memory, by Nabakov has alarmingly beautiful language, which is par for the course with Nabakov. His memories of attaching certain colors to corresponding phonemes is entirely unique.

I've also recently read the first part of the newest version of Mark Twain's autobiography. I would recommend it to those of us who love Mark Twain.

If you would like a mixture of fact and fiction in memoir form, one can do no better than Maxine Hong Kingston's "Woman Warrior."

Everitt wrote: "I recently read Kevin Smith's Tough Shit: Life Advice from a Fat, Lazy Slob Who Did Good which I loved. A very touching though hilarious and dirty story by one of my favorite directors.

There are..."

I second Medium Raw, although I enjoy Bourdain's earlier anger.

Thank you everyone! Quite a few of these are on my TBR list already, so it's good to know others enjoyed them as well. Particularly, Nabokov's & Frank McCourt's, both of which I have been wanting to read for some time now. I purchased Angela's Ashes, Teacher Man and 'Tis on whim - I suppose I was just giving them the benefit of the doubt that they would be good reads.

Wastrel, I really appreciated all the effort and thought you put into your post and be assured that I read the entire thing and will check out the book further, thank you so much.

I've never been a big fan of Anthony Bourdain's show or brand of humour but I am always interested in reading about people in general. I think, if I come across it in my used book perusing, I'll pick up Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook and give it a go since that seems to be the general consensus as the favorite one.

Everitt wrote: "I'm so ashamed of myself for not thinking of this until I saw it on the shelf... How can you not include A Moveable Feast?"

I can't believe I this one wasn't already on my TBR list! I feel like a dunce! It's surely there now, thank you!

I've read Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors which was great. I picked up 127 Hours: Between a Rock and a Hard Place the other week too.

Then there was Billy Connolly's, written by his wife (Billy). One of the funniest men ever!

I love The Pythons' Autobiography, because it's 6 in 1 really.

As an aspiring guitarist I've read Slash, Clapton, Life though they're pretty much the same book to anyone that isn't a fan, which is a bit of a let down. Keef's a funny bugger, though. Yay for reminding me to pick up Redemption Song: The Ballad of Joe Strummer.

I like reading memoirs and I thinkBob Dylan: Chronicles and Bound for Glory are pretty good. If you like odd and unusual try Serious Pleasures: the Life of Stephen Tennant or Granny Made Me An Anarchist

Thank you Graham and Paul! For me, there is never a thing as too many memoirs to check out. I'm eager to dive into some of the ones suggested by everyone here. :]