Whose story is this?
What stories do we have the right to tell?
Okay, yes, as I talked about on Monday, I’m back to writing. I’m committed. Or addicted? Compelled? Those might be better words.
Knowing that you need to write isn’t the happy ending you might think it is. There’s still the day-to-day struggle that is getting your butt in a chair. And then the big question—what do I write?
Over the summer (before I quit) I started a series of short stories set in Madison, most of them beginning with the kernel of some true thing. A story someone told me. A rumor. They’re stories, so I don’t have to verify their truth. But also, they’re not my stories and they do at least begin with actual people. Now I’m asking myself—is that okay?
As a sociologist, my inclination is to say no. In my life as a social scientist, there are very specific rules about the relationship between researchers and their subjects. There’s a strict code of ethics to protect people’s anonymity and not do research that, you know, messes people up.
In fiction, there are no such rules. Sure, don’t plagiarize, but no one tells you what to do with the stories people tell you. In fact, you’re supposed to be gathering those stories. As a writer, they’re your raw materials. But I can’t lie—sometimes the idea of reflecting other people’s lives on the page gives me pause.
The very first story I ever published started with a real event and one line of a conversation in particular that I couldn’t get out of my head. I was ecstatic to have the story published. My first ever! It was such a milestone. But I was also anxious that the person who inspired it would read it and recognize themselves.
If they did, I never heard about it. What writers have going for us is that people often don’t recognize themselves in stories. A lot of this has to do with the fact that it ends up not being them after all. I can start with a real person I know, but after a few pages, they become someone else. Mostly.
Then sometimes there are characters who are so real, you just know they have to be closely based on some actual person. You will never convince me that Elizabeth Strout doesn’t have a real Olive Kitteridge somewhere in her life.
The weirdness of taking other people’s stories and making them your own is part of what scares me about memoir. I can’t write my own story without including all the key characters and how could I possibly do that in a way that wasn’t at least a little hurtful? I like reading memoirs, but they also make me cringe, knowing that someone out there is reading a less-than-flattering depiction of themselves.
On the other hand, there’s a chance people like showing up as a character in someone’s memoir. Maybe we enjoy having our stories told, even it’s not us doing the telling. Maybe it’s the same thrill as being an extra in a movie or TV show. I have to say that as someone who did show up in someone else’s memoir essay, there was nothing thrilling about it.
Writing is always an act of control. You’re taking the world out there and cramming it into your own narrative. This is true of fiction or memoir. Narrative is power. I create the ending I want. At times, it feels like I’m a spoiled and overgrown child, sitting my dolls down just so and making them say what I want them to say.
Sometimes I think I should start with my own story before I move onto anyone else’s. I should exorcise my own demons. Turn myself into a character and see how it feels.
Other times, I think I’ve already done that. In the end, every character I write is a different version of me, split off and fragmented. I can fool myself, but my story is really the only story I’m ever telling.
I don’t know. Maybe the truth is somewhere in between.
What do you think? Anyone ready to sign up for a starring role in someone else’s story? Who’s thinking, “Guess I should be careful what I say around writers,” which is absolutely true.
Three new subscribers away from the 200 mark, which is awesome! Thank you so much for following along as my brain wanders to all the weirdest places.