Tuesday, October 8, 2013
In the Family of Truth
I am working on a poem (okay, a triptych of poems, or maybe a suite) about an actual event, or series of events, in my family--tragic ones, taboo subjects. I an interspersing actual facts with metaphorical "facts". On an artistic level, they work together well, but I wonder, how will my family members react (should they read what I write; they almost never do, but going rogue with the taboo stuff just might attract some attention).
For example, will they argue that this person did not play the mandolin, as I have suggested he did by having one leaning on his wall? Will they say, you could never have had that conversation with that person at that time (for some absolutely true logistical reasons)?
Is it worse that I include real details about that person--should I just switch everything up to avoid that problem, so that the factual and the invented aren't intertwined? If I do that, the poem loses its gut-punch for me, but it shouldn't do so for an audience who doesn't know the actual details, while perhaps sparing my family members who do......
But I don't want to take out the "true" stuff just because I added non-factual details to yet make the poem even more true, in a larger sense.
This is what I'm thinking about.
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11 comments:
I believe it's always better to abide by what you feel is true and real. In my experience family never recognised themselves in anecdotes on family occasions, I' m sure in our dysfunctional family certain members had an idealised view of themselves with total amnesia about anything that didn't show them in a glowing light. They always denied they did anything contradicting their self view should anyone be bold enough to point it out. You have to be true to yourself and as you say, chances are certain others may never read your work anyway.
Anne, you are so right about people not recognizing themselves....I once asked a sister to read what I'd written about our family and she said, "I didn't even realize this was about our family." To be fair, maybe I'm the one that needs to see things in a certain light though, or at least I'm as guilty as they are.
As it happens, in this case it's more of a really sad story than a tale of misbehavior. However, our family is pretty dysfunctional with how we handle grief, and that's part of what I'm trying to get at.
Thanks for your encouraging comments!
In my view, what's most important is emotional truth. Readers won't know the facts, and even family members will quibble over what's "factual" and what's not. What will last in the reader's mind and heart is what's "true" on a deeper, felt, mostly unnameable level.
Good for you for taboo busting!
Write what you saw, what you felt, and write it as truthfully as you can. That is all you have control over.
Mari, yes, I agree with you in theory. But when it comes to putting the spin on my own family, it takes more gall than perhaps I have. And yet, I continue.....
Hi Tressa, in my reply comment in the next post chronologically, I explain how I'm writing stuff I didn't see and putting in details that are good for the sound of the poem but aren't true, and even details that justify how I feel but not what I know (though these details don't happen to make anyone look bad, just not themselves).....so it's not just a case of what I remember seeing and feeling. I'm outright making stuff up.....and I'm not sure how I feel about that.....
If you're not writing a non-fiction but using a family issue and family members as inspiration for what will ultimately be a fictional poem, which it sounds like you're doing, than there is nothing to worry about. Of course no one you use as inspiration is going to look like themselves. When your work is done it won't be them or even about the taboo issue that is the inspirations but about the "bigger truth" that you want to get across in the work.
Hi Tressa, yes you are right....However, I use enough idiosyncratic details that it will be recognizable by family as based on them....but yes, just based on them, not entirely them.
Recently someone wrote something about me and I was surprised at how much I disliked it.....it's not a neutral thing, to have something written about you, even loosely based on you.
Anyway, here I go....
I can't remember who said that if anyone got to meet themselves they would hate themselves (hence the expression "opposites attract"). You did mention that your family doesn't (or rarely) reads your writing. Perhaps that is something to take solace in right now. Good luck in whichever way you choose to express yourself with this taboo issue!
Interesting quote, Tressa. Thanks for your continuing encouragement too.
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