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As you read the selections in this chapter, you will see how different authors craft stories about an important event in their lives.

Analyzing how these writers tell a dramatic, well-focused story; use vivid, specific description to enliven their writing; and choose details and words that help readers understand why the event was so memorable will help you see how you can employ these same techniques when writing your own autobiographical story.

Determine the writer’s purpose and audience.

Many people write about important events in their lives to archive their memories and to learn something about themselves. Choosing events that are important to them personally, writers strive to imbue their stories with meaning and feeling that will resonate with readers. That is, they seek to help readers appreciate what we call the event’s autobiographical significance— why the event is so memorable for the writer and what it might mean for readers. Often writers use autobiographical stories to reflect on a conflict that remains unresolved or one they still do not fully understand. Autobiographical stories may not only prompt readers to reflect on the writer’s complicated and ambivalent emotions, puzzling motivations, and strained relationships. They may also help readers see larger cultural themes in these stories or understand implications the writer may not even have considered.

When reading the selections about remembered events that follow, ask yourself questions like these:

What seems to be the writer’s purpose (or multiple, perhaps even conflicting purposes)?

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How does the author want readers to react?

Assess the genre’s basic features.

As you read about the remembered events in this chapter, analyze and evaluate how different authors use the basic features of the genre. The examples that follow are taken from the reading selections that appear later in this Guide to Reading.

A WELL-TOLD STORY

Read first to see how the story attempts to engage readers:

Many of these basic narrative elements can be visualized in the form of a dramatic arc (see Figure 2.1), which you can analyze to see how a story creates and resolves dramatic tension.

Exposition/Inciting Incident: Background information and scene setting, introducing the characters and the initial conflict or problem that sets off the action, arousing curiosity and suspense

Rising Action: The developing crisis, possibly leading to other conflicts and complications

Climax: The emotional high point, often a turning point marking a change for good or ill

Falling Action: Resolution of tension and unraveling of conflicts; may include a final surprise

Conclusion/Reflection: Conflicts come to an end but may not be fully resolved, and writer may reflect on the event’s meaning and importance—its significance

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Notice the narrating strategies used to create action sequences. Narrating action sequences relies on such strategies as using action verbs (such as walked) in different tenses or in conjunction with prepositional phrases or other cues of time or location to depict movement and show the relation among actions in time. In the following example, notice that I walked occurred in the past — after I had found and before I was about to drop it:

I walked back to the basket where I had found the button and was about to drop it when suddenly, instead, I took a quick glance around, assured myself no one could see, and slipped the button into the pocket of my sweatshirt. (Brandt, par. 3)

In addition to moving the narrative along, action sequences may also contribute to the overall or dominant impression and help readers understand the event’s significance. In this example, Brandt’s actions show her ambivalence or inner conflict. While her actions seem impulsive (“suddenly”), they are also self-conscious, evidenced by her stopping midway to see if anyone is watching.

VIVID DESCRIPTION OF PEOPLE AND PLACES

Look for the describing strategies of naming, detailing, and comparing. In this example, Annie Dillard uses all three strategies to create a vivid description of a Pittsburgh street on one memorable winter morning:

The cars’ tires laid behind them on the snowy street a complex trail of beige chunks like crenellated castle walls. I had stepped on some earlier; they squeaked. (Dillard, par. 5)

Notice the senses the description evokes. In the example above, Dillard relies mainly on visual details to identify color, texture, and shape of the snowy tire tracks. But she also tells us what the chunks of snow sounded like when stepped on.

Think about the impression made by the descriptions, particularly by the comparisons (similes and metaphors). For example, Dillard’s comparison of tire tracks to crenellated castle walls suggests a kind of starry-eyed romanticism, an impression that is echoed by her reflections at the end of the story. As you will see, descriptions like this contribute to an overall or dominant impression that helps readers grasp the event’s significance.

Finally, notice how dialogue is used to portray people and their relationships. Autobiographers use dialogue to characterize the people involved in the event, showing what they’re like by depicting how they talk and interact. Speaker tags identify who is speaking and indicate the speaker’s tone or attitude. Here’s a brief example that comes at the climax of Dillard’s story when the man finally catches the kids he’s been chasing:

“You stupid kids,” he began perfunctorily. (Dillard, par. 18)

Consider why the writer chose to quote, paraphrase, or summarize. Quoting can give dialogue immediacy, intensify a confrontation, and shine a spotlight on a relationship. For example, Brandt uses quoting to make an inherently dramatic interaction that much more intense.

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“I don’t understand. What did you take? Why did you do it? You had plenty of money with you.”

“I know but I just did it. I can’t explain why. Mom, I’m sorry.”

“I’m afraid sorry isn’t enough. I’m horribly disappointed in you.” (pars. 33–35)

Paraphrasing enables the writer to choose words for their impact or contribution to the dominant impression.

Next thing I knew, he was talking about calling the police and having me arrested and thrown in jail, as if he had just nabbed a professional thief instead of a terrified kid. (Brandt, par. 7)

The clichés (thrown in jail and nabbed) mock the security guard, aligning Brandt with her father’s criticism of the police at the story’s end.

Summarizing gives the gist. Sometimes writers use summary because what was said or how it was said isn’t as important as the mere fact that something was said:

. . . the chewing out was redundant, a mere formality, and beside the point. (Dillard, par. 19)

AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SIGNIFICANCE

Look for remembered feelings and thoughts from the time the event occurred. Notice in the first example that Brandt announces her thoughts and feelings before describing them, but in the second example she simply shows her feelings by her actions:

The thought of going to jail terrified me. . . . I felt alone and scared. (par. 17)

Long after we got off the phone,. . . I could still distinctly hear the disappointment and hurt in my mother’s voice. I cried. (36)

Look also for present perspective reflections about the past. In this example, Desmond-Harris uses rhetorical questions (questions she poses and then answers) to set up her present-day adult perspective on her past.

Did we take ourselves seriously? Did we feel a real stake in the life of this “hard-core” gangsta rapper, and a real loss in his death? We did, even though we were two mixed-race girls raised by our white moms in a privileged community. . . . (par. 8)

Notice that writers sometimes express both their past and present feelings, possibly to contrast them or to show that they have not changed. Observe the time cues Orner and Desmond-Harris use to distinguish between past and present feelings:

Now that he is older and far milder, it is hard to believe how scared I used to be of my father. (Orner, par. 8)

I mourned Tupac’s death then, and continue to mourn him now, because his music represents the years when I was both forced and privileged to confront what it meant to be black. (Desmond-Harris, par. 9)

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Mark word choices in descriptive and narrative passages that contribute to the dominant impression and help to show why the event or person was significant. For example, Brandt shows her feeling of shame vividly in this passage:

As the officers led me through the mall, I sensed a hundred pairs of eyes staring at me. My face flushed and I broke out in a sweat. (par. 18)

Consider whether the story’s significance encompasses mixed or ambivalent feelings and still-unresolved conflicts. For example, notice the seesawing of feelings Brandt reports: