Fearless Confessions: A Writer's Guide to Memoir

FOUR: Plotting Your Life

Chapter Four --------------------------------------------------------------Plotting Your Life lotisasimportantinmemoirasitisinfiction.Infiction,plot is invented; in nonfiction, it is discovered. In a novel, you invent each scene, each episode, fabricating all sorts of trouble for your main character in order to thwart her or his wishes and desires. You create antagonists with whom your protagonist engages in conflict. You concoct roadblock after roadblock that your protagonist battles in order to reach the end of her or his plotted journey. In nonfiction, we scrutinize our lived lives to discover our plots. We select only those significant, relevant details that enhance them. Memoirists erase extraneous people and events from that fully painted canvas of their lives, anything that doesn’t reveal the plot. As we erase irrelevantmoments,we’rehighlightingandemphasizingrelevantones, those that best propel our plot forward. There is, however, an important similarity in terms of plot between these two genres. The novelist John Gardner, in his book On Becoming aNovelist,emphasizestheneedforimmersingthereaderin“avividand continuous dream.” In memoir, plot must likewise engage and mesmerize the reader. While life has down time (say when we lie around channel surfing), a memoir doesn’t! As you ponder which events best illuminateyourstory,trytoidentifyyourmostacutemomentsinorder to hold the reader’s attention. This doesn’t necessarily mean a constant flood of blood, sweat, and tears. Rather, what this means is that you, the author, must feel a strong sense of urgency that must be vividly 36 plotting your life presented to the reader. The events you choose can be life altering in a big way, such as divorce, illness, addiction, birth, the death of a loved one.Buttheseeventscanalsobelifealteringinsmallerways,suchasan irresistible urge to pick early blooming tulips before a spring blizzard. Examine why these tulips are important. What do they mean to you? How do they fit into the overall arc of your life? Finding the Arc of Your Story Memoirs that convey a profound sense of depth, self-reflection, and urgency—that continuous dream—implement two distinct plots. These two lines intersect throughout the memoir in order to fully develop the story. Horizontal Plot This line resembles a traditional plot in fiction in that it tells your story in terms of action. It represents external events. This plot relates the factsalmostasifyou’restillinthatmoment,backthen,whentheevents occurred. Let me tell you what just happened to me! While your memoir (like a novel) doesn’t have to be written chronologically, still, this line shows events unfolding. And they must unfold causally. That’s the essence of plot. Each event is dependent upon what happened before. This narrative of actionrevealshowoneeventcausesthenext ,andthenext—likepushing the first domino in a line and watching them all tumble, one after the other. To return to our unwed teenage mother, here’s how she might begin to construct her plot: “My period was three weeks late. I feared I was pregnant. I walked five blocks through a cold April drizzle to the drugstore to purchase a home pregnancy test. By the time I reached the store, my frigid hands, trembling with fear, could barely open my wallet to pay for it.” What’s the initial spark that causes the action to start? The woman fears she’s pregnant. What’s the subsequent effect? She buys a home pregnancy test. plotting your life 37 When following a causal plot line, be sure to include only relevant details. Other than the trip to the drugstore, what else happened to the woman the morning she awoke and realized her period was three weeks late? Suppose, just as she’s about to leave for the drugstore, a FedEx driver pulls up to her house and asks her to sign a receipt for a package. Or suppose, just as she’s about to open the door to the drugstore , a friend stops her, reminding her about a math test on Monday. Why doesn’t the author include these two events as she recounts the story of this fateful morning? After all, that’s how it really happened. She doesn’t include them because they aren’t relevant. These details don’t impact the plot line: I’m pregnant; what will I do about it? Selectingplotdetailsiscrucial.Weigheacheventorimagebyasking yourself whether it’s pertinent to the story you’re writing. Vertical Plot This line focuses more on the internal journey, plunging the plot into the heart of emotions, thoughts, and insights. This is the thinking and feeling part of the narrative. How do thoughts and emotions evolve over the course of...