I’m going to say it
up front. I think authors are a courageous lot! In fact, any creative person
who risks putting his or her work out there for others to peruse or assess or
admire or love or tear to shreds deserves a huge dose of heartfelt encouragement,
in my opinion.
In recent weeks, the
first draft of my second memoir has begun the rounds of my three manuscript
readers/editors. In conversation with one of these good people, I saw again how
diverse our reading preferences are, let alone our approach to life in general.
‘I would never want
to be as open about things as you are,’ she told me, ‘but if you’re fine with
it, then that’s all that matters. I guess that’s one reason I don’t like the
whole genre of memoir very much. I prefer to live in the moment and get on with
things rather than dwell on the past and think about everything in such detail.’
‘That’s okay,’ I
told her. ‘We’re all different. But I would still value your comments. And I’m
happy for you to mark any sections where you feel I've been too introspective
or made too much of certain incidences in my life. After all, I don’t want to
bore anyone too much.’
Later, I remembered
the reception my first memoir, Soul
Friend, received two years ago. Many faithful readers of my novels loved
it. Some encouraged me to write more non-fiction. Some did not give me any feedback—and
their silence spoke volumes. Some did not buy it because they prefer novels. Those
who never read fiction were delighted I had finally come up with a memoir
instead of yet another novel. I gained a whole new group of readers—but I lost
some as well. And through this experience, I decided there was little point in
trying to please everyone.
Then, in preparing my
memoir writing workshop for the Christian Writers’ Conference next month (see http://www.christianwritersconference.dx.am/),
I decided to read a few more books on memoir. Lo and behold, I discovered thoughts
about memoir I had never even considered when writing my own—let alone agreed
with. As well, I read a variety of memoirs and, in the process, found myself
quite bored with several of them. They were far too inward-looking, even for me,
with one or two almost becoming bogged in that mire of introspection and
description of minutiae. Yet some had received glowing reviews. And some had
even won prestigious awards. In the end, I realised again that, even within one
reasonably narrow genre, we cannot hope to please everyone.
So, what’s to be
done? First and foremost, let’s make sure our security lies in who we are in
God and not in what anyone thinks of our work. Yes, we need to listen to all
those writing critiques, take on board what we need to and improve as much as we
can. But let’s remember we will never please everyone. Second, let’s learn to listen
well to God’s Spirit, the Encourager, speaking to us in that still, small voice
every moment of the day as we write. And third, as faithful companions on this
crazy writing journey we have undertaken, let’s keep on encouraging—that is, ‘putting
courage into’—one another in whatever familiar or diverse way we can.
Jo-Anne Berthelsen lives
in Sydney but grew up in Brisbane. She holds degrees in Arts and
Theology and has worked as a high school teacher, editor and secretary, as well
as in local church ministry. Jo-Anne is passionate about touching hearts and
lives through both the written and spoken word. She is the author of six published
novels and one non-fiction work, Soul Friend: the story of a shared spiritual
journey. Jo-Anne is married to a retired minister and has three grown-up
children and four grandchildren. For more information, please visit www.jo-anneberthelsen.com.
