mini memoir assignment

18 Essay-Length Short Memoirs to Read Online on Your Lunch Break

Emily Polson

Emily Polson is a freelance writer and publishing assistant at Simon & Schuster. Originally from central Iowa, she studied English and creative writing at Belhaven University in Jackson, Mississippi, before moving to a small Basque village to teach English to trilingual teenagers. Now living in Brooklyn, she can often be found meandering through Prospect Park listening to a good audiobook. Twitter: @emilycpolson | https://emilycpolson.wordpress.com/

View All posts by Emily Polson

I love memoirs and essays, so the genre of essay-length short memoirs is one of my favorites. I love delving into the details of other people’s lives. The length allows me to read broadly on a whim with minimal commitment. In roughly 5–30 minutes, I can consume a complete morsel of literature, which always leaves me happier than the same amount of time spent doom-scrolling through my various social news feeds.

What are short memoirs? 

What exactly are short memoirs? I define them as essay-length works that weave together life experiences around a central theme. You see examples of short memoirs all the time on sites like Buzzfeed and The New York Times . Others are stand-alone pieces published in essay collections.

Memoir essays were my gateway into reading full-length memoirs. It was not until I took a college class on creative nonfiction that I realized memoirs were not just autobiographies of people with exciting lives. Anyone with any amount of life experience can write a memoir—no dramatic childhood or odd-defying life accomplishments required. A short memoir might be an account of a single, life-changing event, or it may be reflection on a period of growth or transition.

Of course, when a young adult tells people she likes writing creative nonfiction—not journalism or technical writing—she hears a lot of, “You’re too young to write a memoir!” and “What could someone your age possibly have to write about?!” As Flannery O’Connor put it, however, “The fact is that anybody who has survived his childhood has enough information about life to last him the rest of his days. If you can’t make something out of a little experience, you probably won’t be able to make it out of a lot. The writer’s business is to contemplate experience, not to be merged in it.”

Memoir essay examples

As the lit magazine Creative Nonfiction puts it, personal essays are just “True stories, well told.” And everyone has life stories worth telling.

Here are a few of my favorite memoir examples that are essay length.

SHORT MEMOIRS ABOUT GROWING UP

Scaachi koul, “there’s no recipe for growing up”.

In this delightful essay, Koul talks about trying to learn the secrets of her mother’s Kashmiri cooking after growing up a first-generation American. The story is full of vivid descriptions and anecdotal details that capture something so specific it transcends to the realm of universal. It’s smart, it’s funny, and it’ll break your heart a little as Koul describes “trying to find my mom at the bottom of a 20-quart pot.”

ASHLEY C. FORD, “THE YEAR I GREW WILDLY WHILE MEN LOOKED ON”

This memoir essay is for all the girls who went through puberty early in a world that sexualizes children’s bodies. Ford weaves together her experiences of feeling at odds with her body, of being seen as a “distraction” to adult men, of being Black and fatherless and hungry for love. She writes, “It was evident that who I was inside, who I wanted to be, didn’t match the intentions of my body. Outside, there was no little girl to be loved innocently. My body was a barrier.”

Kaveh Akbar, “How I Found Poetry in Childhood Prayer”

Akbar writes intense, searing poetry, but this personal essay contextualizes one of his sweetest poems, “Learning to Pray,” which is cradled in the middle of it. He describes how he fell in love with the movement, the language, and the ceremony of his Muslim family’s nightly prayers. Even though he didn’t (and doesn’t) speak Arabic, Akbar points to the musicality of these phonetically-learned hymns as “the bedrock upon which I’ve built my understanding of poetry as a craft and as a meditative practice.” Reading this essay made me want to reread his debut poetry collection, Calling a Wolf a Wolf , all over again.

JIA TOLENTINO, “LOSING RELIGION AND FINDING ECSTASY IN HOUSTON”

New Yorker staff writer Jia Tolentino grew up attending a Houston megachurch she referred to as “the Repentagon.” In this personal essay, she describes vivid childhood memories of her time there, discussing how some of the very things she learned from the church contributed to her growing ambivalence toward it and its often hypocritical congregants. “Christianity formed my deepest instincts,” she writes, “and I have been walking away from it for half my life.” As the essay title suggests, this walking away coincided with her early experiences taking MDMA, which offered an uncanny similarity to her experience of religious devotion.

funny short memoirs

Patricia lockwood, “insane after coronavirus”.

Author Patricia Lockwood caught COVID-19 in early March 2020. In addition to her physical symptoms, she chronicled the bizarre delusions she experienced while society also collectively operated under the delusion that this whole thing would blow over quickly. Lockwood has a preternatural ability to inject humor into any situation, even the dire ones, by highlighting choice absurdities. This is a rare piece of pandemic writing that will make you laugh instead of cry–unless it makes you cry from laughing.

Harrison Scott Key,  “My Dad Tried to Kill Me with an Alligator”

This personal essay is a tongue-in-cheek story about the author’s run-in with an alligator on the Pearl River in Mississippi. Looking back on the event as an adult, Key considers his father’s tendencies in light of his own, now that he himself is a dad. He explores this relationship further in his book-length memoir, The World’s Largest Man , but this humorous essay stands on its own. (I also had the pleasure of hearing him read this aloud during my school’s homecoming weekend, as Key is an alumnus of my alma mater.)

David Sedaris, “Me Talk Pretty One Day”

Sedaris’s humor is in a league of its own, and he’s at his best in the title essay from Me Talk Pretty One Day . In it, he manages to capture the linguistic hilarities that ensue when you combine a sarcastic, middle-aged French student with a snarky French teacher.

SAMANTHA IRBY, “THE WORST FRIEND DATE I EVER HAD”

Samantha Irby is one of my favorite humorists writing today, and this short memoir essay about the difficulty of making friends as an adult is a great introduction to her. Be prepared for secondhand cringe when you reach the infamous moment she asks a waiter, “Are you familiar with my work?” After reading this essay, you’ll want to be, so check out Wow, No Thank You . next.

Bill Bryson, “Coming Home”

Bryson has the sly, subtle humor that only comes from Americans who have spent considerable time living among dry-humored Brits. In “Coming Home,” he talks about the strange sensation of returning to America after spending his first twenty years of adulthood in England. This personal essay is the first in a book-length work called I’m a Stranger Here Myself , in which Bryson revisits American things that feel like novelties to outsiders and the odd former expat like himself.

Thought-provoking Short memoirs

Tommy orange, “how native american is native american enough”.

Many people claim some percentage of Indigenous ancestry, but how much is enough to “count”? Novelist Tommy Orange–author of There There –deconstructs this concept, discussing his relationship to his Native father, his Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood, and his son, who will not be considered “Native enough” to join him as an enrolled member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes. “ How come math isn’t taught with stakes?” he asks in this short memoir full of lingering questions that will challenge the way you think about heritage. 

Christine Hyung-Oak Lee, “I Had a Stroke at 33”

Lee’s story is interesting not just because she had a stroke at such a young age, but because of how she recounts an experience that was characterized by forgetting. She says that after her stroke, “For a month, every moment of the day was like the moment upon wakening before you figure out where you are, what time it is.” With this personal essay, she draws readers into that fragmented headspace, then weaves something coherent and beautiful from it.

Kyoko Mori, “A Difficult Balance: Am I a Writer or a Teacher?”

In this refreshing essay, Mori discusses balancing “the double calling” of being a writer and a teacher. She admits that teaching felt antithetical to her sense of self when she started out in a classroom of apathetic college freshmen. When she found her way into teaching an MFA program, however, she discovered that fostering a sanctuary for others’ words and ideas felt closer to a “calling.” While in some ways this makes the balance of shifting personas easier, she says it creates a different kind of dread: “Teaching, if it becomes more than a job, might swallow me whole and leave nothing for my life as a writer.” This memoir essay is honest, well-structured, and layered with plenty of anecdotal details to draw in the reader.

Alex Tizon, “My Family’s Slave”

In this heartbreaking essay, Tizon pays tribute to the memory of Lola, the domestic slave who raised him and his siblings. His family brought her with them when they emigrated to America from the Philippines. He talks about the circumstances that led to Lola’s enslavement, the injustice she endured throughout her life, and his own horror at realizing the truth about her role in his family as he grew up. While the story is sad enough to make you cry, there are small moments of hope and redemption. Alex discusses what he tried to do for Lola as an adult and how, upon her death, he traveled to her family’s village to return her ashes.

Classic short memoirs

James baldwin, “notes of a native son”.

This memoir essay comes from Baldwin’s collection of the same name. In it, he focuses on his relationship with his father, who died when Baldwin was 19. He also wrestles with growing up black in a time of segregation, touching on the historical treatment of black soldiers and the Harlem Riot of 1943. His vivid descriptions and honest narration draw you into his transition between frustration, hatred, confusion, despair, and resilience.

JOAN DIDION,  “GOODBYE TO ALL THAT”

Didion is one of the foremost literary memoirists of the twentieth century, combining journalistic precision with self-aware introspection. In “Goodbye to All That,” Didion recounts moving to New York as a naïve 20-year-old and leaving as a disillusioned 28-year-old. She captures the mystical awe with which outsiders view the Big Apple, reflecting on her youthful perspective that life was still limitless, “that something extraordinary would happen any minute, any day, any month.”  This essay concludes her masterful collection,   Slouching Towards Bethlehem .

Tim O’Brien, “The Things They Carried”

This is the title essay from O’Brien’s collection, The Things They Carried . It’s technically labeled a work of fiction, but because the themes and anecdotes are pulled from O’Brien’s own experience in the Vietnam War, it blurs the lines between fact and fiction enough to be included here. (I’m admittedly predisposed to this classification because a college writing professor of mine included it on our creative nonfiction syllabus.) The essay paints an intimate portrait of a group of soldiers by listing the things they each carry with them, both physical and metaphorical. It contains one of my favorite lines in all of literature: “They all carried ghosts.”

Multi-Media Short Memoirs

Allie brosh, “richard”.

In this blog post/webcomic, Allie Brosh tells the hilarious story about the time as a child that she, 1) realized neighbors exist, and 2) repeatedly snuck into her neighbor’s house, took his things, and ultimately kidnapped his cat. Her signature comic style drives home the humor in a way that will split your sides. The essay is an excerpt from Brosh’s second book, Solutions and Other Problems , but the web version includes bonus photos and backstory. For even more Allie classics, check out “Adventures in Depression” and “Depression Part Two.”

George Watsky, “Ask Me What I’m Doing Tonight”

Watsky is a rapper and spoken word poet who built his following on YouTube. Before he made it big, however, he spent five years performing for groups of college students across the Midwest. “Ask Me What I’m Doing Tonight!” traces that soul-crushing monotony while telling a compelling story about trying to connect with people despite such transience. It’s the most interesting essay about boredom you’ll ever read, or in this case watch—he filmed a short film version of the essay for his YouTube channel. Like his music, Watsky’s personal essays are vulnerable, honest, and crude, and the whole collection, How to Ruin Everything , is worth reading.

If you’re looking for even more short memoirs, keep an eye on these pages from Literary Hub , Buzzfeed , and Creative Nonfiction . You can also delve into these 25 nonfiction essays you can read online and these 100 must-read essay collections . Also be sure to check out the “Our Reading Lives” tag right here on Book Riot, where you’ll find short memoirs like “Searching for Little Free Libraries as a Way to Say Goodbye” and “How I Overcame My Fear of Reading Contemporary Poets.”

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If you’ve thought about putting your life to the page, you may have wondered how to write a memoir. We start the road to writing a memoir when we realize that a story in our lives demands to be told. As Maya Angelou once wrote, “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”

How to write a memoir? At first glance, it looks easy enough—easier, in any case, than writing fiction. After all, there is no need to make up a story or characters, and the protagonist is none other than you.

Still, memoir writing carries its own unique challenges, as well as unique possibilities that only come from telling your own true story. Let’s dive into how to write a memoir by looking closely at the craft of memoir writing, starting with a key question: exactly what is a memoir?

How to Write a Memoir: Contents

What is a Memoir?

• Memoir vs Autobiography

Memoir Examples

Short memoir examples.

• How to Write a Memoir: A Step-by-Step Guide

A memoir is a branch of creative nonfiction , a genre defined by the writer Lee Gutkind as “true stories, well told.” The etymology of the word “memoir,” which comes to us from the French, tells us of the human urge to put experience to paper, to remember. Indeed, a memoir is “ something written to be kept in mind .”

A memoir is defined by Lee Gutkind as “true stories, well told.”

For a piece of writing to be called a memoir, it has to be:

• Nonfictional
• Based on the raw material of your life and your memories
• Written from your personal perspective

At this point, memoirs are beginning to sound an awful lot like autobiographies. However, a quick comparison of Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love , and The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin , for example, tells us that memoirs and autobiographies could not be more distinct.

Next, let’s look at the characteristics of a memoir and what sets memoirs and autobiographies apart. Discussing memoir vs. autobiography will not only reveal crucial insights into the process of writing a memoir, but also help us to refine our answer to the question, “What is a memoir?”

Memoir vs. Autobiography

While both use personal life as writing material, there are five key differences between memoir and autobiography:

1. Structure

Since autobiographies tell the comprehensive story of one’s life, they are more or less chronological. writing a memoir, however, involves carefully curating a list of personal experiences to serve a larger idea or story, such as grief, coming-of-age, and self-discovery. As such, memoirs do not have to unfold in chronological order.

While autobiographies attempt to provide a comprehensive account, memoirs focus only on specific periods in the writer’s life. The difference between autobiographies and memoirs can be likened to that between a CV and a one-page resume, which includes only select experiences.

The difference between autobiographies and memoirs can be likened to that between a CV and a one-page resume, which includes only select experiences.

Autobiographies prioritize events; memoirs prioritize the writer’s personal experience of those events. Experience includes not just the event you might have undergone, but also your feelings, thoughts, and reflections. Memoir’s insistence on experience allows the writer to go beyond the expectations of formal writing. This means that memoirists can also use fiction-writing techniques , such as scene-setting and dialogue , to capture their stories with flair.

4. Philosophy

Another key difference between the two genres stems from the autobiography’s emphasis on facts and the memoir’s reliance on memory. Due to memory’s unreliability, memoirs ask the reader to focus less on facts and more on emotional truth. In addition, memoir writers often work the fallibility of memory into the narrative itself by directly questioning the accuracy of their own memories.

Memoirs ask the reader to focus less on facts and more on emotional truth.

5. Audience

While readers pick up autobiographies to learn about prominent individuals, they read memoirs to experience a story built around specific themes . Memoirs, as such, tend to be more relatable, personal, and intimate. Really, what this means is that memoirs can be written by anybody!

Ready to be inspired yet? Let’s now turn to some memoir examples that have received widespread recognition and captured our imaginations!

If you’re looking to lose yourself in a book, the following memoir examples are great places to begin:

• The Year of Magical Thinking , which chronicles Joan Didion’s year of mourning her husband’s death, is certainly one of the most powerful books on grief. Written in two short months, Didion’s prose is urgent yet lucid, compelling from the first page to the last. A few years later, the writer would publish Blue Nights , another devastating account of grief, only this time she would be mourning her daughter.
• Patti Smith’s Just Kids is a classic coming-of-age memoir that follows the author’s move to New York and her romance and friendship with the artist Robert Maplethorpe. In its pages, Smith captures the energy of downtown New York in the late sixties and seventies effortlessly.
• When Breath Becomes Air begins when Paul Kalanithi, a young neurosurgeon, is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Exquisite and poignant, this memoir grapples with some of the most difficult human experiences, including fatherhood, mortality, and the search for meaning.
• A memoir of relationship abuse, Carmen Maria Machado’s In the Dream House is candid and innovative in form. Machado writes about thorny and turbulent subjects with clarity, even wit. While intensely personal, In the Dream House is also one of most insightful pieces of cultural criticism.
• Twenty-five years after leaving for Canada, Michael Ondaatje returns to his native Sri Lanka to sort out his family’s past. The result is Running in the Family , the writer’s dazzling attempt to reconstruct fragments of experiences and family legends into a portrait of his parents’ and grandparents’ lives. (Importantly, Running in the Family was sold to readers as a fictional memoir; its explicit acknowledgement of fictionalization prevented it from encountering the kind of backlash that James Frey would receive for fabricating key facts in A Million Little Pieces , which he had sold as a memoir . )
• Of the many memoirs published in recent years, Tara Westover’s Educated is perhaps one of the most internationally-recognized. A story about the struggle for self-determination, Educated recounts the writer’s childhood in a survivalist family and her subsequent attempts to make a life for herself. All in all, powerful, thought-provoking, and near impossible to put down.

While book-length memoirs are engaging reads, the prospect of writing a whole book can be intimidating. Fortunately, there are plenty of short, essay-length memoir examples that are just as compelling.

While memoirists often write book-length works, you might also consider writing a memoir that’s essay-length. Here are some short memoir examples that tell complete, lived stories, in far fewer words:

• “ The Book of My Life ” offers a portrait of a professor that the writer, Aleksandar Hemon, once had as a child in communist Sarajevo. This memoir was collected into Hemon’s The Book of My Lives , a collection of essays about the writer’s personal history in wartime Yugoslavia and subsequent move to the US.
• “The first time I cheated on my husband, my mother had been dead for exactly one week.” So begins Cheryl Strayed’s “ The Love of My Life ,” an essay that the writer eventually expanded into the best-selling memoir, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail .
• In “ What We Hunger For ,” Roxane Gay weaves personal experience and a discussion of The Hunger Games into a powerful meditation on strength, trauma, and hope. “What We Hunger For” can also be found in Gay’s essay collection, Bad Feminist .
• A humorous memoir structured around David Sedaris and his family’s memories of pets, “ The Youth in Asia ” is ultimately a story about grief, mortality and loss. This essay is excerpted from the memoir Me Talk Pretty One Day , and a recorded version can be found here .

So far, we’ve 1) answered the question “What is a memoir?” 2) discussed differences between memoirs vs. autobiographies, 3) taken a closer look at book- and essay-length memoir examples. Next, we’ll turn the question of how to write a memoir.

How to Write a Memoir: A-Step-by-Step Guide

1. how to write a memoir: generate memoir ideas.

how to start a memoir? As with anything, starting is the hardest. If you’ve yet to decide what to write about, check out the “ I Remember ” writing prompt. Inspired by Joe Brainard’s memoir I Remember , this prompt is a great way to generate a list of memories. From there, choose one memory that feels the most emotionally charged and begin writing your memoir. It’s that simple! If you’re in need of more prompts, our Facebook group is also a great resource.

2. How to Write a Memoir: Begin drafting

My most effective advice is to resist the urge to start from “the beginning.” Instead, begin with the event that you can’t stop thinking about, or with the detail that, for some reason, just sticks. The key to drafting is gaining momentum . Beginning with an emotionally charged event or detail gives us the drive we need to start writing.

3. How to Write a Memoir: Aim for a “ shitty first draft ”

Now that you have momentum, maintain it. Attempting to perfect your language as you draft makes it difficult to maintain our impulses to write. It can also create self-doubt and writers’ block. Remember that most, if not all, writers, no matter how famous, write shitty first drafts.

Attempting to perfect your language as you draft makes it difficult to maintain our impulses to write.

4. How to Write a Memoir: Set your draft aside

Once you have a first draft, set it aside and fight the urge to read it for at least a week. Stephen King recommends sticking first drafts in your drawer for at least six weeks. This period allows writers to develop the critical distance we need to revise and edit the draft that we’ve worked so hard to write.

5. How to Write a Memoir: Reread your draft

While reading your draft, note what works and what doesn’t, then make a revision plan. While rereading, ask yourself:

• What’s underdeveloped, and what’s superfluous.
• Does the structure work?
• What story are you telling?

6. How to Write a Memoir: Revise your memoir and repeat steps 4 & 5 until satisfied

Every piece of good writing is the product of a series of rigorous revisions. Depending on what kind of writer you are and how you define a draft,” you may need three, seven, or perhaps even ten drafts. There’s no “magic number” of drafts to aim for, so trust your intuition. Many writers say that a story is never, truly done; there only comes a point when they’re finished with it. If you find yourself stuck in the revision process, get a fresh pair of eyes to look at your writing.

7. How to Write a Memoir: Edit, edit, edit!

Once you’re satisfied with the story, begin to edit the finer things (e.g. language, metaphor , and details). Clean up your word choice and omit needless words , and check to make sure you haven’t made any of these common writing mistakes . Be sure to also know the difference between revising and editing —you’ll be doing both. Then, once your memoir is ready, send it out !

Learn How to Write a Memoir at Writers.com

Writing a memoir for the first time can be intimidating. But, keep in mind that anyone can learn how to write a memoir. Trust the value of your own experiences: it’s not about the stories you tell, but how you tell them. Most importantly, don’t give up!

Anyone can learn how to write a memoir.

If you’re looking for additional feedback, as well as additional instruction on how to write a memoir, check out our schedule of nonfiction classes . Now, get started writing your memoir!

25 Comments

Thank you for this website. It’s very engaging. I have been writing a memoir for over three years, somewhat haphazardly, based on the first half of my life and its encounters with ignorance (religious restrictions, alcohol, and inability to reach out for help). Three cities were involved: Boston as a youngster growing up and going to college, then Washington DC and Chicago North Shore as a married woman with four children. I am satisfied with some chapters and not with others. Editing exposes repetition and hopefully discards boring excess. Reaching for something better is always worth the struggle. I am 90, continue to be a recital pianist, a portrait painter, and a writer. Hubby has been dead for nine years. Together we lept a few of life’s chasms and I still miss him. But so far, my occupations keep my brain working fairly well, especially since I don’t smoke or drink (for the past 50 years).

Hi Mary Ellen,

It sounds like a fantastic life for a memoir! Thank you for sharing, and best of luck finishing your book. Let us know when it’s published!

Best, The writers.com Team

Hello Mary Ellen,

I am contacting you because your last name (Lavelle) is my middle name!

Being interested in genealogy I have learned that this was my great grandfathers wife’s name (Mary Lavelle), and that her family emigrated here about 1850 from County Mayo, Ireland. That is also where my fathers family came from.

Is your family background similar?

Hope to hear back from you.

Richard Lavelle Bourke

Hi Mary Ellen: Have you finished your memoir yet? I just came across your post and am seriously impressed that you are still writing. I discovered it again at age 77 and don’t know what I would do with myself if I couldn’t write. All the best to you!! Sharon [email protected]

I am up to my eyeballs with a research project and report for a non-profit. And some paid research for an international organization. But as today is my 90th birthday, it is time to retire and write a memoir.

So I would like to join a list to keep track of future courses related to memoir / creative non-fiction writing.

Hi Frederick,

Happy birthday! And happy retirement as well. I’ve added your name and email to our reminder list for memoir courses–when we post one on our calendar, we’ll send you an email.

We’ll be posting more memoir courses in the near future, likely for the months of January and February 2022. We hope to see you in one!

Very interesting and informative, I am writing memoirs from my long often adventurous and well travelled life, have had one very short story published. Your advice on several topics will be extremely helpful. I write under my schoolboy nickname Barnaby Rudge.

[…] How to Write a Memoir: Examples and a Step-by-Step Guide […]

I am writing my memoir from my memory when I was 5 years old and now having left my birthplace I left after graduation as a doctor I moved to UK where I have been living. In between I have spent 1 year in Canada during my training year as paediatrician. I also spent nearly 2 years with British Army in the hospital as paediatrician in Germany. I moved back to UK to work as specialist paediatrician in a very busy general hospital outside London for the next 22 years. Then I retired from NHS in 2012. I worked another 5 years in Canada until 2018. I am fully retired now

I have the whole convoluted story of my loss and horrid aftermath in my head (and heart) but have no clue WHERE, in my story to begin. In the middle of the tragedy? What led up to it? Where my life is now, post-loss, and then write back and forth? Any suggestions?

My friend Laura who referred me to this site said “Start”! I say to you “Start”!

Hi Dee, that has been a challenge for me.i dont know where to start?

What was the most painful? Embarrassing? Delicious? Unexpected? Who helped you? Who hurt you? Pick one story and let that lead you to others.

I really enjoyed this writing about memoir. I ve just finished my own about my journey out of my city then out of my country to Egypt to study, Never Say Can’t, God Can Do It. Infact memoir writing helps to live the life you are writing about again and to appreciate good people you came across during the journey. Many thanks for sharing what memoir is about.

I am a survivor of gun violence, having witnessed my adult son being shot 13 times by police in 2014. I have struggled with writing my memoir because I have a grandson who was 18-months old at the time of the tragedy and was also present, as was his biological mother and other family members. We all struggle with PTSD because of this atrocity. My grandson’s biological mother was instrumental in what happened and I am struggling to write the story in such a way as to not cast blame – thus my dilemma in writing the memoir. My grandson was later adopted by a local family in an open adoption and is still a big part of my life. I have considered just writing it and waiting until my grandson is old enough to understand all the family dynamics that were involved. Any advice on how I might handle this challenge in writing would be much appreciated.

I decided to use a ghost writer, and I’m only part way in the process and it’s worth every penny!

Hi. I am 44 years old and have had a roller coaster life .. right as a young kid seeing his father struggle to financial hassles, facing legal battles at a young age and then health issues leading to a recent kidney transplant. I have been working on writing a memoir sharing my life story and titled it “A memoir of growth and gratitude” Is it a good idea to write a memoir and share my story with the world?

Thank you… this was very helpful. I’m writing about the troubling issues of my mental health, and how my life was seriously impacted by that. I am 68 years old.

[…] Writers.com: How to Write a Memoir […]

[…] Writers.com: “How to Write a Memoir” […]

I am so grateful that I found this site! I am inspired and encouraged to start my memoir because of the site’s content and the brave people that have posted in the comments.

Finding this site is going into my gratitude journey 🙂

We’re grateful you found us too, Nichol! 🙂

Firstly, I would like to thank you for all the info pertaining to memoirs. I believe am on the right track, am at the editing stage and really have to use an extra pair of eyes. I’m more motivated now to push it out and complete it. Thanks for the tips it was very helpful, I have a little more confidence it seeing the completion.

Well, I’m super excited to begin my memoir. It’s hard trying to rely on memories alone, but I’m going to give it a shot!

Thanks to everyone who posted comments, all of which have inspired me to get on it.

Best of luck to everyone! Jody V.

I was thrilled to find this material on How to Write A Memoir. When I briefly told someone about some of my past experiences and how I came to the United States in the company of my younger brother in a program with a curious name, I was encouraged by that person and others to write my life history.

Based on the name of that curious program through which our parents sent us to the United States so we could leave the place of our birth, and be away from potentially difficult situations in our country.

As I began to write my history I took as much time as possible to describe all the different steps that were taken. At this time – I have been working on this project for 5 years and am still moving ahead. The information I received through your material has further encouraged me to move along. I am very pleased to have found this important material. Thank you!

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Last updated on Apr 06, 2021

21 Memoir Examples to Inspire Your Own

Writing a memoir is a daunting endeavor for any author: how do you condense your entire life story into a mere couple hundred pages? Of course, you'll find plenty of online guides that will help you write a memoir by leading you through the steps. But other times that old adage “ show, don’t tell ” holds true, and it’s most helpful to look at other memoir examples to get started. 

If that’s the case for you, we’ve got you covered with 21 memoir examples to give you an idea of the types of memoirs that have sold well. Ready to roll up your sleeves and dive in? 

The autobiographical memoir

The autobiographical memoir — a retelling of one’s life, from beginning to present times — is probably the standard format that jumps to most people’s minds when they think of this genre.

At first glance, it might seem like a straightforward recount of your past. However, don’t be deceived! As you’ll be able to tell from the examples below, this type of memoir shines based on three things: the strength of the author’s story, the strength of the story’s structure, and the strength of the author’s voice.

I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou. The woman who Toni Morrison said “launched African American writing in the United States,” Angelou penned this searing memoir in 1969, which remains a timeless classic today.

Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris. Less of a singular memoir than a collection of humorous anecdotes framed around his life as a transplant to Paris, the star of this book is Sedaris’ dry voice and cutting humor.

A Two-Spirit Journey by Ma-Nee Chacaby. Chacaby’s remarkable life — from growing up abused in a remote Ojibwa community to overcoming alcoholism and coming out as a lesbian as an adult — is captured in this must-read autobiography.

The “experience” memoir

One of the most popular memoirs that you’ll find on bookshelves, this type focuses on a specific experience that the author has undergone. Typically, this experience involves a sort of struggle, such as a bitter divorce, illness, or perhaps a clash with addiction. Regardless of the situation, the writer overcomes it to share lessons learned from the ordeal.

In an "experience" memoir, you can generally expect to learn about:

• How the author found themselves facing said experience;
• The obstacles they needed to overcome; and
• What they discovered during (and after) the experience.

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi. Faced with the prognosis of terminal cancer at the age of thirty-six, Paul Kalanithi wrote an unforgettable memoir that tackles an impossible question: what makes life worth living?

A Million Little Pieces by James Frey. An account of drug and alcohol abuse that one reviewer called “the War and Peace of addiction,” this book became the focus of an uproar when it was revealed that many of its incidents were fabricated. (In case you’re wondering, we do not recommend deceiving your readers.)

Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen. Adapted in 1999 into a critically acclaimed film starring Angelina Jolie, Girl, Interrupted enduringly recounts the author’s battle with mental illness and her ensuing 18-month stay in an American psychiatric hospital.

The “event” memoir

Similar to the “experience” memoir, the “event” memoir centers on a single significant event in the author’s life. However, while the former might cover a period of years or even decades, the “event” memoir zeroes in on a clearly defined period of time — for instance, a two-month walk in the woods, or a three-week mountain climb, as you’ll see below.

Walden by Henry David Thoreau. In July of 1845, Henry David Thoreau walked into the woods and didn’t come out for two years, two months, and two days. This is the seminal memoir that resulted.

Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster by Jon Krakauer. The controversial account of the 1996 Everest disaster, as written by author-journalist Krakaeur, who was climbing the mountain on the same day that eight climbers were killed.

The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion. Immortalized as one of the classic books about mourning, The Year of Magical Thinking recounts the grief Didion endured the year following the death of her husband.

The “themed” memoir

When you look back on your own timeline, is there a strong theme that defines your life or ties it all together? That’s the premise on which a “themed” memoir is based. In such a memoir, the author provides a retrospective of their past through the lens of one topic.

If you’re looking to write this type of memoir, it goes without saying that you’ll want to find a rock-solid theme to build your entire life story around. Consider asking yourself:

• What’s shaped your life thus far?
• What’s been a constant at every turning point?
• Has a single thing driven all of the decisions that you’ve made?

Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby. Throughout an up-and-down upbringing complete with a debilitating battle with depression, the single consistent thread in this author’s life remained football and Arsenal F.C.

Educated by Tara Westover. If there’s one lesson that we can learn from this remarkable memoir, it’s the importance of education. About a family of religious survivalists in rural Idaho, this memoir relates how the author overcame her upbringing and moved mountains in pursuit of learning.

Call the Midwife by Jennifer Worth. Now best known for its BBC adaptation, Worth’s account of her life as a midwife caught people’s imagination with its depiction of life in London’s East End in the 1950s.

The family memoir

In a family memoir, the author is a mirror that re-focuses the light on their family members — ranging from glimpses into the dysfunctional dynamics of a broken family to heartfelt family tributes.

Examples of this type of memoir

Brother, I’m Dying by Edwidge Danticat. A love letter to her family that crosses generations, continents, and cultures, Brother, I’m Dying primarily tells the intertwined stories of two men: Danticat’s father and her uncle.

Native Country of the Heart by Cherrie Moraga. The mother is a self-made woman who grew up picking cotton in California. The daughter, a passionate queer Latina feminist. Weaving the past with the present, this groundbreaking Latinx memoir about a mother-daughter relationship confronts the debilitating consequences of Alzheimer's disease.

The childhood memoir

A subset of the autobiographical memoir, the childhood memoir primarily focuses (spoiler alert!) on the author’s childhood years. Most childhood memoirs cover a range of 5 - 18 years of age, though this can differ depending on the story.

Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt. The groundbreaking winner of the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for Biography or Autobiography, McCourt’s memoir covers the finer details of his childhood in impoverished Dublin.

Boy: Tales of Childhood by Roald Dahl. Evoking his schoolboy days in the 1920s and 30s, the stories in this book shed light on themes and motifs that would play heavily in Dahl’s most beloved works: a love for sweets, a mischievous streak, and a distrust of authority figures.

The travel memoir

What happens when you put an author on a plane? Words fly!

Just kidding. While that’s perhaps not literally how the travel memoir subgenre was founded, being on the move certainly has something to do with it. Travel memoirs have been written for as long as people could traverse land — which is to say, a long time — but the modern travel narrative didn’t crystallize until the 1970s with the publication of Paul Theroux’s Great Railway Bazaar and Bruce Chatwin’s In Patagonia .

In a travel memoir, the author isn’t the star of the show: the place is. You can expect to find these elements in a travel memoir:

• A description of the place
• A discussion of the culture and people
• How the author experienced the place and dealt with setbacks during the journey

Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. Proof that memoirs don’t have to tell catastrophic stories to succeed, this book chronicles Gilbert’s post-divorce travels, inspiring a generation of self-care enthusiasts, and was adapted into a film starring Julia Roberts.

The Great Railway Bazaar by Paul Theroux. A four-month journey from London to East Asia (and back again) by train, this is the book that helped found the modern travel narrative.

The celebrity memoir

The celebrity memoir is just that: a memoir published by a celebrity. Though many celebrity memoirs are admittedly ghostwritten, the best ones give us an honest and authentic look at the “real person” behind the public figure.

Note that we define “celebrity” broadly here as anyone who is (or has been) in the public spotlight. This includes:

• Political figures
• Sports stars
• Actors and actresses

Paper Lion by George Plimpton. In 1960, the author George Plimpton joined up with the Detroit Lions to see if an ordinary man could play pro football. The answer was no, but his experience in training camp allowed him to tell the first-hand story of a team from inside the locker room.

Troublemaker by Leah Remini. The former star of TV’s The King of Queens tackles the Church of Scientology head-on, detailing her life in (and her decision to leave) the controversial religion.

It’s Not About the Bike by Lance Armstrong. This is a great lesson on the way authors often write books to create their own legacy in the way they see fit. As history confirmed, Armstrong’s comeback success wasn’t entirely about the bike at all.

Now that you know what a memoir looks like, it’s time to get out your pen and paper, and write your own memoir ! And if you want even more memoir examples to keep being inspired? We’ve got you covered: here are the 30 best memoirs of the last century .

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How to Write Memoir: Examples, Tips, and Ideas for School &College students

Everyone has the right to write his memoir; there is no need to become famous. If you want to write your memoirs quickly and successfully, our article will help you. It has all the helpful information for writing and practical examples and instructions on how to write an outline.

• ✔️ What Is a Memoir

✨ Memoir Examples and Ideas

• 🖊 ️ How to Write a Memoir

🔗 References

✔️ what is a memoir.

A memoir is a genre of non-fiction in which the author recounts specific historical events that they witnessed or participated in . This type of work can show either the author’s entire life as a biography or a particular event that they experienced.

Memoir Characteristics

Initially, the memoir genre acted as a subjective description of the past through the prism of the author’s life in it. An essential feature of memoirs is the claim for the authenticity of the reconstructed history and, accordingly, the documentary nature of the text, although, in reality, not all memoirs are truthful and accurate.

They have several stylistic features of memoir:

• Clear relevance to the history
• Factoriality
• Chronological narrative

Examples of memoirs can be diaries, notebooks, correspondence, memos, or travel notes.

You can get a better idea of what a memoir is in our free essays database.

Memoir vs. Autobiography

Despite the outward similarities between these types of literature, there is still a difference between memoir and autobiographical literature. They are entirely different genres that are independent and complete works.

The best way to understand how to write this type of work is to see examples. That’s why we’ve given you examples of 100-word student memoirs below.

1. I dreamed of being an artist and becoming a doctor, and I don’t regret it. The dream of becoming a journalist has haunted me since my childhood. Back then, I was a very young boy, inspired by late-night TV shows and concerts. Those were glorious times when the well-known rock bands performed on stages, the real heroes. Wanting to become the darling of the audience, a hero like these guys, from time to time, I picked up a comb and sang into it in front of the mirror, impersonating the lead singer of one of them. Time passed, and fate had it so that now – 10 years later – I’m an emergency room doctor. You’d think my dream never came true. But it wasn’t. Over time, I realized that even though I do not have colossal fame and am not a hero to many teenagers, I did what I wanted – every day, I and my colleagues save lives. 2. Being sad for no reason frustrates me. For me, sadness can even be pleasant; justifying it in any way I can – I can imagine myself in that person’s shoes, listening to the sad music of the main character in a dramatic movie. I can look out the window as I cry and think, “This is so sad. I can’t even believe how sad this whole situation is.” Even reproducing my sadness can bring an entire theater audience to tears.” Feeling sorry for myself in times of sorrow intensifies it in me at such moments. 3. 1998 – This was the year my life changed. My friends and I went on a mountain trip, and as we were climbing rocks, I got oxygen deprivation at a certain altitude. Then my life was saved by people close to me. It was a moment after which I decided to live each year as if it were my last. It meant spending two years in New York City and focusing on loving life. It meant making new friends. It meant saying yes to many other things. It meant that my priorities were no longer the same as most.

If you would like to see more extensive examples of memoirs, the Fictional Memoir of Kerry Brodie and the Sociological Mini-Memoir on Personality Development would be remarkable for that.

6-word Memoir Examples

It is not necessary to write many paragraphs. Sometimes only 6 words are enough. There is a type of memoir of just one sentence. Mostly they are quotes from famous people, but no one forbids everyone to compose them. Here are some 6-word memoir examples:

• Unrehearsed, honest, unstoppable, and succeeding gradually
• Because of my big dreams, I’m always stressed.
• Every day is thinking of dreams , still thinking.
• The supremacy of reason over the dictatorship of emotion.
• Never let anyone steal your joy !
• Keep up the fight! Don’t give up .
• Loved his soul, not his money.
• A dream journey for all of us.
• At first glance, she was gentle.
• I was happy , and then I wasn’t.
• The right choice saves lives.

Memoir Prompts

To write a memoir, you must first choose a topic. Here are prompt ideas to help you:

• Write about your first love.
• Write how you survived the 2020 crisis.
• Write about the best trip of your life.
• Discuss friendship and what it means in your life.
• What are some of the things you regret that you didn’t do?
• Explain what you have too much of and what you have not had enough of in your life.
• Write about how you got into trouble.
• Tell me what aspect of your personality you are proud of.
• Write about what kind of music helped you cope with stress .
• Tell me how you felt when your father taught you to ride a bicycle .
• Tell about a situation in your life when you were insanely happy.
• Tell us about your most reckless purchase.
• Write about a goal that was easy for you to achieve.
• Discuss how you met your friends.
• Talk about a situation that is beyond your understanding.

Memoir Topics

What are some excellent memoir topics? Check out the list of memoir ideas:

• Hiking with friends in the mountains.
• How I survived Hurricane Katrina .
• Breathtaking Victoria Peak in Tokyo.
• Moving to another country left a mark on me.
• A man who saved my life.
• The problem of gun control and how it affected me.
• The lawsuits between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard led to a confrontation between my friends.
• The time when I lived in a house with a beautiful view of the mountains.
• A strange incident happened in my home in the middle of the night.
• Watching my favorite movie with my family.
• Fear of flying an airplane.
• Today I’m glad I made the right choice.
• My best friend at school.
• My car broke down in the middle of a mountain road.
• I didn’t get to be a designer .
• I never got to make up with my grandfather.
• A long trip to Europe.
• Switzerland won my heart.
• My favorite dish and memories associated with it.
• The war in Yugoslavia left a mark on me.
• How I found the courage to say “NO.”
• Surfing in Bali.
• The most horrible injury of my life.
• Winning a chess competition.
• Studying at Harvard .
• I didn’t help a man in trouble, and karma found me.
• Organizing the most massive event in town.
• Playing in the casino made me poor.
• The job that made me brave.
• The plane crash I survived.

🖊️ How to Write a Memoir

Now you can get out your pen and paper and start writing. Any work has specific rules and structure, and memoirs are no exception.

When you are writing a memoir, organizing all your memories makes sense. A peculiarity of this genre is that the author recalls their emotions and impressions as they write. They can negatively affect the work because they can mess up the structure and order. In addition, you may accidentally start telling stories that run parallel to the main story and “go astray.”

A well-written memoir synopsis will help you prevent this.

How to write a memoir outline?

Here are a few steps:

• Represent the main character . There will also necessarily be an antagonist in a person, situation, or circumstance. You need to “hook the reader’s interest in the first act. Examples of a successful hook will be below.
• Involve some drama, conflict, and critical events . All of your emotions need to be revealed, as do all of the events. In this part, your problems become more entangled and complex, as shown through scenes of actions and reactions that highlight your journey of change, transformation, and discovery of true or false.
• The drama, conflicts, and problems reach a climax , and the person (you) has completed the action, having had the experience. There are many endings in which the reader feels happy, sad, satisfied, with cause for reflection, etc. But the ending should always leave the reader feeling that the story is complete.

You can use this memoir outline template when writing your work:

Memoir Introduction

A memoir should reveal intense, exciting, and real-life discoveries from the first lines to the end of the first chapter. If you are just beginning to write your memoir, follow these writing tips on how to start:

• Engage. There’s nothing like a gripping hook to keep the reader engaged. Elizabeth Gilbert, for example, opens her bestseller Eat, Pray, Love with an intimate moment.
• Build credibility. From the beginning, tell your story as if you’re sharing a secret you’ve never told anyone. This approach makes the reader a confidant and builds trust from the start.
• Evoke emotion . Write your first pages from the heart. Use language that resonates with people on an emotional level. One of the best ways to evoke emotion in your reader is to talk about yourself.
• Lead the story with a laugh. Try leading with humor, whether you’re writing about your childhood or your memoir is about a darker story.
• Reveal a dramatic moment . Choose a dramatic moment to begin your memoir. You can revisit the event in more detail later, but it may interest the reader if you share a compelling glimpse of what is to come.
• Think like a fiction writer . A memoir is the true story of your life, but it should also include the structural elements of fiction. In your exposition, be sure to set the stage for the rest of the book by establishing yourself as the protagonist, laying out the source of the conflict, and highlighting the central theme.
• Keep it relevant. There are a million little details and life experiences that can be interesting on their own, but if they don’t support your story, you should exclude them.
• Chronology in the introduction is optional . Start writing the part of the story that inspires you the most, and then go back to your beginning after you finish your first draft. As you register, you will find the perfect start.

Memoir Hook Examples

As mentioned earlier, the memoir structure involves having a clear that draws the reader in the hook.

What’s it for?

First, the hook arouses the reader’s interest. Second, it reveals a situation, a feeling, an emotion, or all of these in a thesis statement. This gives the reader a chance to understand what the story will be about and get attention.

Effective hook characteristics:

• 1-2 sentences
• Brings emotions
• Goes beyond a memoir

You can see a great hook in a live example of a memoir, as well as in the examples below:

• At the Chess Olympiad then, everyone gave me a standing ovation.
• At that moment, I was one of the first to feel the fear of death.
• Broken knees and even my nose, but I still tried to pedal, getting on my bike time after time.
• I heard a scream. Something terrible had happened.
• The waterfall overshadowed all my memories with its beauty, even my first love.
• Few have spent their lives in Africa treating tigers.
• It’s about a historical event
• I was sure my parachute wouldn’t open
• The mass shooting at Columbine Middle School. I would have rather died than my friends.
• All the students were amazed to see an elderly professor doing somersaults, demonstrating the laws of physics.

Memoir Conclusion Examples

As you know, your story must have a beginning and an end. In the end, there needs to be a conclusion. Describe what you got out of your situation, how your life changed afterward, or what you gained or lost. You may want to jump back in time, perhaps many years in advance, to complete your story and summarize it for readers long after the “period” your memoir covers has ended.

And now, grab these memoir conclusion examples:

1. This journey along the river took all my energy. But it was nothing compared to the people I got to know. Billy, Miles, and Ashley seemed like strangers to me, but now we talk every day, and we see each other on weekends, reminiscing about our shared adventures on the Mississippi. 2. The moment the hurricane grabbed me and lifted me into the air, something changed in my mind. I thought I was about to die and was ready to accept it. But fate gave me a chance for salvation, and I took it. After that event, I became a different person; I rethought all the values in life and began to look at problems from another side. Although the trauma of that day still affects me, I’m happy with how my life has changed. 3. For a week after I had recovered from my serious injury, I had not heard from my unit in Afghanistan. The doctors told me not to get nervous, and no one gave me any information. Then on Wednesday, at 2 p.m., I heard the doorbell ring. It was Sean, the deputy squad leader, and a couple of other privates from our squad, safe and sound. A feeling of joy immediately filled me, and they broke into my house and started giving me a friendly hug and patting me on the back. All I could think about was how glad I was that they were in one piece, and the phrase kept rolling through my head, “We did it, Sean, we did it.”

These are just a few examples of the completion of a memoir. It’s enough to get the gist of a well-written.

As you can see, anyone can write a memoir, and it’s not as hard as it sounds. Now that you know how to write an outline, an introduction, and a conclusion, you have seen short memoir examples. You will write a fantastic memoir.

Don’t forget to share this article with your friends.

What Are the 5 Parts of a Memoir?

A memoir should contain 5 crucial elements: the truth, theme, first-person narration style, voice, and perception. The focused theme, demonstration of a specific event or experience, and conflict. The writing style of your memoir should be straightforward and spare. Supporting details will add charm to your memoir, and giving elements to your narrative will help the reader relive some of the emotions you experienced.

What Is the Purpose of a Memoir?

A memoir’s primary purpose is to recall an event from the past and present it to the reader in an exciting way. At the same time, it is necessary to conclude that it will be interesting for your audience.

What Is a Personal Memoir?

The essence of a personal memoir is that you write about what happened to you personally. Remember how you felt in those moments, and sincerely communicate that in your work. Only you can tell the story of your life that will make others more prosperous spiritually. A memoir about yourself examples is in the article.

How Many Words Should Be In a Memoir?

The standard size of a memoir is about 60,000 to 80,000 words. That’s about the size of the average novel. Can a memoir be smaller, like 40,000 words? Sure. Its main point is for the author to tell a story to the reader.

What Is the Difference Between Memoir and Biography?

These two genres are generally similar and are part of non-fiction. The critical difference is that while a memoir focuses explicitly on a particular incident or experience and attempts to highlight a point of view, a biography presents chronological events from a specific person’s life without emphasizing a specific experience. Also, unlike memoirs, which emphasize individual emotions, biography tends to be more general.

• The Personal Memoir: Purdue Writing Lab
• Audience Considerations for ESL Writers: Introduction: Purdue Writing Lab
• Making an Outline: USC Libraries
• Outline Components: Purdue Writing Lab
• Memoir | Definition, Examples, & Facts: Encyclopedia Britannica
• What Is a Memoir? – Definition & Examples: Study.com
• Six-Word Memoirs: UPENN
• Writing a Memoir: Dallas Baptist University
• Memoir: An Introduction: Oxford Scholarship
• Writing Memoir | Monmouth University
• Writing Lives: Autobiography in Fiction and Memoir – ANU
• Biography and Memoir | CUNY Graduate Center
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Micro Memoir: Writing Your Life in 200 Words or Less

If you haven’t been published before, try your hand at micro memoir—the hottest new category in publishing. Micro memoirs are very short standalone pieces, often exploring a moment in time, drawn from personal experience. The best micro memoirs combine truth-telling with narrative tension and are specific, not general. Whether you are a blogger or an aspiring one, whether you are a memoirist, want to get published for the first time or are a widely published author looking to update your skills, you will leave this class with six ready-to-publish micro memoir CNF pieces. We will review published examples of micro-memoir (in The New York Times Tiny Love Stories (100 words), Metropolitan Diary , River Teeth’s Tiny Beautiful Things , and more) to see why they entertained, resonated with or compelled the reader, and practice creative nonfiction writing techniques like listing, using description and detail, the six-word memoir exercise, and free association. You will also learn valuable advice on crafting your work, while gaining insight and advice via recorded video interviews from editors working in the micro memoir space. Students will write at least six creative nonfiction pieces geared to specific publications and receive feedback from classmates and the instructor. At the end of the class, students will be invited to participate in a live online reading session, where they can share what they’ve written. This course is delivered in an online, self-paced (asynchronous) format. The instructor interacts with students and facilitates group discussions within NYU’s online learning platform. There are weekly deadlines for lesson and assignment completion.

More details

You'll Walk Away with

• Six creative non-fiction micro memoir pieces.
• Knowledge of the growing micro memoir publishing market and where to submit your micro memoir
• Memoirists and aspiring memoirists
• Writers and aspiring writers of all levels
• The curious and creative

Course Details

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WRIT1-CE9067

Continuing Education Units (CEU)

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Writing a Mini-Memoir: Sharing Your Abundant Life with the Future Generation

Do you want to write a memoir, but never find the time for such a big project? Or, are you not really used to writing? Do you grapple with the issue of not wanting to ruin any of your relationships, even after you are no longer alive?

What about writing a mini-memoir?

My Idea of a Mini-Memoir

A few years ago, I received a memoir written by a contemporary of my grandmother – a woman who grew up in the same town, Lueneburg, Germany.

This short piece was only 17 pages long. Yet, it carried me into the woman’s world and life. It described the people in her world, including my grandmother’s great Aunt Betty, and it totally captivated me. “Wow,” I thought. “This is a great idea.”

Why does a memoir have to be a huge undertaking or a long book? What about a mini-memoir that travels the pathways you traversed in your lifetime, meandering through your world, describing what it felt like at different moments in the context of the political winds and national events?

Even describing the technology as it evolved is fascinating. You know that already if you’ve ever described life before cell phones, YouTube, and navigators to the younger generation. The mini-memoir can be a perfect vehicle.

Wanting to Know More

I am lucky as I have videotaped interviews of both my parents about their lives. My father even wrote his autobiography. But that only makes me hunger for stories from previous generations.

I would just love to read the story of my German Jewish grandmother who we called Oma. What did the world look like for Oma and her sisters? What was it like to attend Oxford University as a woman in the 20s of a past century and yet become a housewife while her sisters became professionals?

Gertrude, who was the head nurse in a Jewish hospital in Hamburg, babysat for me. Aunt Lottie was our doctor. But they seemed very ancient to me, and I was too young to ask questions. Now I’d like to know: How did it feel for them to come to the US, fleeing Nazi Germany in their 50s?

I don’t know their stories, I have only a few black and white photos of the three sisters traveling to Yellowstone and other National Parks dressed in skirts hanging below their knees and laced ‘grandma’ shoes that Oma always wore.

What Is a Mini-Memoir?

I looked up mini-memoirs on Google and found a slightly different concept than the one I present here. According to the resource I read, to write a mini-memoir you can either take one episode of your life and tell the story, or take a picture from the past and see what memories it sparks for you.

Both are very good ideas – but mine is a bit different. According to my concept, writing a mini-memoir goes as follows:

Make a short sweep over your whole life. Tell about your childhood, teenage years, young adult years, and the next stages of your life as you go from your 30s up through your current age.

Highlight your experiences during those different stages of your life. If you can, tell stories along the way. How were you feeling? What did you learn during that time in your life?

Describe your world, the people you knew along the way, what it looked like in the places you lived. Don’t forget to include the technology.

Give the context in terms of what was going on in the world. How did it affect you?

Share your values, describe what mattered in your life, and speak through the window of your identity as you experience the world now.

My Tips to Writing a Mini-Memoir

To begin, you can:

• Look at a photograph from a time in your life that serves as a memory for you. Describe the moment, the feelings that come up, and even words that were spoken.
• Get together with a friend or family member and share some stories, jotting down notes and ideas.
• Do an outline or map of your life and place the stories inside it.
• Good writing includes showing rather than telling. Describe, describe, describe.
• Share your beliefs in ways that are not preachy.
• Try not to throw anyone under the bus including yourself (through self-deprecating remarks).

If you are working on a longer memoir, kudos to you. That is a wonderful undertaking and I recommend it. The mini-memoir idea is for the person who feels that they are not ready to take that leap. Or at least, not yet.

Take a minute to consider trying to do the mini-memoir. It may just turn into a longer project, but even if it doesn’t, a mini-memoir has value in its own right – standing for future generations as a way to share your life with people who come after you in its simple 17- to 20-page glory.

Let’s Have a Conversation:

What do you think about memoirs? Do you think you could write your own? Does a mini-memoir sound like a good idea? Please share your thoughts in the comments below.

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Sounds great. Thanks for the construct: journey past 30… I have sent your article to my four siblings. We are all Elders now and Black Lives from Iowa; a great place to be from.

Thank you for sharing these ideas. The structure you’ve laid out makes a somewhat, where do I start? exercise, seem quite manageable.

I am of Asian origin, an 81 year old Educator from an Early childhood,to Elementary grades teacher, to mentoring / consulting 72 ECE Directors on achieving highest quality programs using the 10 NAEYC Standards of Delivering Excellence.(National Education of Young Children.) I was still working until pandemic (Covid 19) I am going back to my country in 8 days for “Me Time”. My middle son 58, just had a kidney transplant of which Mom was the only primary caregiver. His 2 boys who are nurses live in Canada and North Carolina. My son is divorced; the wife is in Colorado with a new partner. My oldest son who has a disability is coming home wth me. I love him so dearly; everyone in the family (making sure I know)has limited time to care for him. My youngest girl, 53, a nurse with 2 grown boys. I started a “My Story”. I promised myself to finish this 2023. I froze. I am anxious for the next steps. I will offend “people”on the way.😏

Elizabeth, Just the little bit you wrote here shows you will have a powerful memoir. I know there is always an issue of offending others. I think you can write your truth and later review it to think about who will be offended and if you want to leave it in. I know that I have mixed feelings when I think that something I might write will hurt someone when I am no longer able to explain or heal it. We all have to make choices as we decide what to include. Good luck on your trip back home.

Hi ! I really appreciate your article! I have been playing with my memoir for five years ..and needless to say it’s in pieces !—-meaning Tupperware boxes , notes here and there photographs,memories ..quite a story…articles like this encourage us to tell our story while we still can . At times I think that nobody would care as I have no children but yet I’ve had quite complex fascinating life and feel a need to tell it still!

I have made a lot of notes and writings ✍️ over my 72 years of life. I would love to put it all together the way you described. Thanks for sharing your ideas.

Tags Creativity

Becki Cohn-Vargas

Becki Cohn-Vargas, Ed.D, has been blogging regularly for Sixty and Me since 2015. She is a retired educator and independent consultant. She's the co-author of three books on identity safe schools where students of all backgrounds flourish. Becki and her husband live in the San Francisco Bay Area and have three adult children and one grandchild. You can connect with her at the links below.

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Writing the Memoir (Moxley): Introduction

• Introduction
• Tips for Writing the Memoir
• Annotated Memoirs
• Describing a Person
• Describing a Place
• Sample Topics and Essays

Introduction to Writing the Memoir

Teaching and writing the memoir .

            A memoir can be one of the most meaningful essays that a student can write and one of the most engaging essays for a teacher to read.  The spirit generated by the memoir can create class fellowship less attainable through subjects requiring pure analysis, description, or narration.  More than any other subject, a memoir demands that a student bring his sensibilities and experiences to school, and when that happens, it is virtually impossible for anyone to accept a mediocrity of passion.  Students and teachers are likely to treat writing as an experience in itself, a means for writers to understand their lives and for teachers to understand their students’ worlds.

              In Terrains of the Heart, Willie Morris writes,

  If it is true that a writer's world is shaped by the experience of childhood and adolescence, then returning at long last to the scenes of those experiences, remembering them anew and living among their changing heartbeats, gives him, as Marshall Frady said, the primary pulses and shocks he cannot afford to lose. I have never denied the poverty, the smugness, the cruelty which have existed in my native state [ Mississippi ].  Meanness is everywhere, but here the meanness, and the nobility, have for me their own dramatic edge, for the fools are my fools, and the heroes are mine too.

  As a young editor who left his native state for New York City, Willie Morris wrote prolifically about his hot Mississippi youth from the cold Northeast.  His essays on home preserve a way of life in the Delta—a complicated history marked by romance and violence—while he lived in a New York far removed from this past.  We sense when reading Willie Morris’s carefully crafted memories that he is coming to know himself through his writing and, in a broader sense, has resurrected a world that can help others understand their own lives.

            To both student and teacher, this is what I hope teaching and writing the memoir will give you:  a chance to investigate your past, your culture, and your lives in general, and in so doing, create a community of authors who delight in the struggle to write clearly, meaningfully, and correctly.

The Rationale

              By clicking here , or by opening the above tab, Annotated Memoirs, you will go to a list of six types of essays, each of which is hyperlinked to a sample essay and a discussion of it. 

              Each sample annotated essay will have the following:

1.  an introduction that comments on the type of essay and how it may generate good writing from young students;

2.  a link to the essay so you can open or print it;

3.  a discussion of the essay, called “The Craft of the Essay,” which explains the strategy in each paragraph or “part” of the essay so that the teacher and student can see how the memoir was crafted from the bare memory.  This section should encourage teacher and student to scrutinize the essay together during a read-aloud session to determine how they think the memory was turned into memoir;

4.  an “Assignment” section that gives the student some specific questions to answer that might help them see the further craft of the particular memoir.

Teaching Strategies

              As with any assignment, the teaching strategy depends on the size of the class, the amount of time allotted for the assignment, how much it is weighted, and so forth.

            Ideally, teaching the memoir should take 6-7 nights of homework.  These nights could be spaced over the course of two-three weeks.

            You could also make it a lighter assignment and cut it to 3-4 assignments, with only one rough draft, instead of the two I suggest.

Homework Assignment #1: 

              The teacher/class decides which category of memoir they will read together as a class to introduce the assignment.  For example, you may choose from the Annotated Memoirs to read the Writing about Death and Mortality assignment and its sample annotated essay “Death of a Pig” by E. B. White.  For this night’s homework, the students should print out the assignment and essay at home to bring to class as their text.  They should read the essay, read the “Craft of the Essay” discussion, and then answer on paper the questions under the “Assignment” section. 

            In class the next day, read the essay aloud (or as much of it as possible), go over the “Craft of the Essay” and finish the day having the students explain their responses to the “Assignment.”

            If there is any time left, you might get the students to discuss the topic, “Where does memory begin?” ( Click here for a passage from Willie Morris's Taps to get the ball rolling. )

  Homework Assignment #2:

              Open the  Sample Topics and Essays  tab to find numerous topics and sample essays.  Decide whether everyone is going to write the same type of essay or whether the topic will be open to a variety of memoirs.  Then read a few sample essays for the topic you choose. 

Written homework is to sit for 40 minutes and do a “fast write,” in which the student writes about half of the first draft of the memory, paying no attention to grammar, style, syntax, or organization. This assignment is to get the student to write or type 2-3 pages of his memory with some, but minimal, revision (the revision should take place after the fast-write).  Click on the tab, Tips for Writing the Memoir, for some help getting started after the fast-write.

            In class the next day, students will read aloud what they have written.  The object is to hear one or two inspiring accounts so that each student can “get the hang of the assignment.”  The teacher should be pushing everyone to develop his “voice.”   Again, see Tips for Writing the Memoir  for a discussion of voice and other terms.

  Homework Assignment #3: 

              Continue where the students left off in Assignment #2 and try to write 4-5 handwritten, or 3-4 typed, pages.  If someone does not like what he/she did in Assignment #2, then start anew.

            In class the next day, have the students read aloud their work.  By the end of this day everyone should have read his/her essay at least once, either on this day or the day before.  The teacher should keep track of who has read.  Again, note how distinct the students’ written voices are, and who is putting in moments of self-reflection and not getting hung up on chronological retelling.

  Homework Assignment #4:

              By this time the students should know the focus of their essay (in other words, what wisdom, revelation, or general idea that their essay is revealing) and should begin “crafting,” or creatively organizing, the memory to become a memoir.

            It is crucial that the student realize that facts are not solely important.  Good memoirs are a blend of fact and creation; this concept will be tough to defend, but the writers of memoir have flexibility regarding the facts of the memory, since it is the “truth” of the memory they are creating; sometimes the facts are too confusing or pallid to have the needed color to make a memory vivid.  For a memory to become memoir, it needs a larger-than-life appeal.  ( Click here for some comments by Dorothy Gallagher on fact versus truth in memoir. )

To craft the essay, for homework (5-10 minutes) try having them draw a timeline of the way the memory works; in class the teacher can draw the timeline of other successful sample essays.  They will see that many essays about a lost loved one starts at the funeral, flashes back to the life, and at the end returns to the funeral.  Flashbacks are crucial to building characters, dead or alive

            Also ask them to outline what they have written as best they can (10-15 minute assignment).  Then, looking at their outlines, they may see a way to restructure the telling of the memory to get the most out of it. 

            The students should be encouraged to imitate the structure of essays that resemble the one they are writing.

            With all this in mind, they should go back and begin writing a new draft for 30 minutes.  In class the next day, have them report on what they’ve changed and have them read some first paragraphs aloud.

    Homework Assignment #5:

              Finish draft number 2.  The students should be keeping track of their rough drafts, as their grade will be based as much on effort and process as on final product.  By now the essays should have incorporated a number of ways to build character, place, and their focus:  short dialogue, concrete descriptions, anecdotes, and moments of reflection.

            Have each student read his or her first 3-4 sentences.  Urge everyone to listen intently and decide which of these sentences should be the first one in the essay.  Frequently, the first paragraph or two can be cut.  It takes most writers about 100 or more words to get warmed up.  Remind them of the Truman Capote Rule:  “I believe more in the scissors than I do the pencil.”

  Homework Assignment #6:

              The final essay is due, approximately 4-5 typed pages.  The student should turn in at least two verifiable rough drafts and the final draft.  The teacher will have heard every student’s paper at least once and should have encouraged each student to drop by for 5-10 minutes during the last 4-5 days to discuss the progress of the memoir.

            The process of this assignment should be weighted as heavily as the final product.  I usually check that the student has written two drafts, contributed to class workshops, and has revised carefully by showing he has learned: 

  (1) to start strategically;

(2) to create the various characters through description, action, anecdote, and brief dialogue;

(3) to create place and atmosphere through concrete description, temperature, climate, and telling details;

(4) to build a strong focus through moments of self-reflection;

(5) to organize strategically, dividing his essay into many paragraphs, some short, some long;

(6) to unify his essay so that, although it may wander, it ultimately returns to some unifying point or image;

(7) to punctuate and write solid sentences that create a pleasing variety and rhythm.

• Willie Morris's "Taps"
• Comments by Dorothy Gallagher
• Next: Tips for Writing the Memoir >>
• Last Updated: Jan 18, 2024 11:10 AM
• URL: https://libguides.montgomerybell.edu/memoir

The past couple of weeks, we have been studying and writing about Elie Wiesel's haunting memoir of the Holocaust,  Night . We've done so with an eye toward (a) enhancing our understanding of 20th-century history, (b) sharpening our interpretive reading skills, but also (c) toward getting a feel for the elements of memoir writing. As you know, in this (last) assignment, you will be allowed to exercise your own "creative" muscle and write something like a miniature memoir of your own.  Search your experience for suggestive ideas and moments that could be commuted into a memoir.

We'll be talking in class about some of the steps en route to your assignment. Here, let me list some of the elements you may want to keep in mind as blossoming writers. While sticking to this (check)list does of course not guarantee a good memoir, it may help guide your efforts as you embark on your creative writing venture.

• Is the occasion of my mini-memoir well chosen? Does the situation have a recognizable conflict (either between characters or within one)?
• Do the characters all measurably contribute to the memoir—i.e., what function(s) do they serve?
• Is my point of view consistent with my intentions as a writer? Does it have a "voice," or perhaps voices, and are these voices (if necessary) sustained throughout?
• Do I establish enough of a setting, in both time and place, to allow the reader to picture the events? Is the memoir sufficiently textured?
• Does the dialogue in the memoir (if it contains any) contribute to it—to the unfolding of events and characters, in the largest sense?
• Does my memoir emphasize telling details that resonate in the reader's mind?
• Does the ending—(in)conclusive as it may be—invite reflection?

Length:           4-5 typed, double-spaced Due Dates:    Mon     27 Nov, three interpretive notebook entries on Night                         Wed    29 Nov , no class in lieu of writing time, conferences, or visiting the Writing Center                        Fri        1 Dec, First draft (bring second copy)                        Mon     4 Dec, no class in lieu of conference time: 10:00–11:30                        Wed     6 Dec, Final Draft (with earlier drafts appended) As with your earlier essays, make sure that you have stapled together your materials so that your final draft is on top and clearly recognizable, followed by your earlier draft(s).

Purpose and Goals: This assignment should help you ( sharpen your reading skills and recognize that memoirs have more than one "fixed/built-in" meaning; ( translate your own experiences into narrative form (or perhaps enable you to invent a story altogether); ( discover your own story telling instinct, and hence part of what, fundamentally, makes us human.

Sincere Tips ( Visit the Writing Center at whatever stages of the writing process you deem necessary. ( Do not print out your paper (at home or at school) on the morning your paper is due. ( As always, think of me as a resource. A toast to all of you future Herman Melvilles and Stephen Kings and Toni Morrisons!

      Dr. Michael Wutz

Memoir Creative Writing Assignment

Also included in

Description

This creative writing assignment guides students to write mini-memoirs of 300–500 words about notable places from their childhoods. Assign it to a creative writing class or use it at the end of a memoir unit—or even in between literature units to give students more practice writing narratives.

The resource includes:

• An exercise to document sensory details from a passage of the memoir Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt
• A prewriting sheet to help each student collect sensory and emotional details to tell a story about a notable place from their childhood
• A rubric that clearly outlines writing requirements

A teacher's guide completed with the details from Angela's Ashes is included. (Note: A link to the excerpt on Google Books is included in the materials for students too.)

Versions of the rubric with and without point values are also included.

This assignment is an uncomplicated but poignant way to get some writing practice into your course!

Other resources you may find helpful:

British Literature Mega Bundle

Macbeth Wrap-Up Activity: The Unanswered Questions of Macbeth

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Bundle

Modernist Short Stories Resource Bundle

Related blog posts:

What to do in English class before winter break

Try a humor unit (especially at the end of the school year!)

Keep in touch with BritLitWit!

Credit: Cover image is from Pixabay and is free for commercial use.

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Class 6 - Messy Lives - Part 2

Welcome back.

Last time, we explored how human lives are often quite messy and complex. All human lives are like this, when you start to look beneath the surface. Last time we talked about those “Great Lives, Great Deeds” memoirs. Two things make these memoirs boring. One is that they ignore the real complexity of human life. And the other is that the author assumes that an account of their life — sanitised and freed of this complexity — is going to be fascinating to the reader. But even if you are interested in the author, this is not usually enough. There are two things we want to make the story compelling.

• An insight into the real complexity beneath the surface.
• A story that has a central topic of theme (or a set of closely-related themes).

Readers want complexity, in other words. They don’t want everything tidied up and sanitsed. But they also want the author to guide them through this complexity.

The Danish philosopher Kierkegaard said that one of the paradoxes of life is (and I’m quoting from memory here) that it is lived forward, but understood backwards. So when we are living life, we can’t necessarily see what is going on, or step outside of the present to understand the forces that are shaping our life. But in retrospect, we can start to pick apart all those dynamics to start to understand what was happening, and its significance.

Hot tip: Memoir tells stories that allow us to experience the way life is lived forwards , but it also leaves room to reflect, and to help us understand backwards .

Review Task

To think about questions of themes, I want you to do an exercise writing a short review of Eberstadt’s piece. Imagine that this is a review that might be published in a magazine or journal. Keep the language informal and non-academic: you are a human being responding to the writing of another human being, not a weird academic robot!

In this review what I want you to do the following:

• Introduce the piece for readers who are unfamiliar to it
• Discuss the main themes that Eberstadt explores
• Talk about your responses to Eberstadt’s piece

You have fifteen minutes.

Themes: Discussion

Thinking about Eberstadt’s piece of writing, what are the main themes that she addresses? How does she address these?

Topics (or Themes), Scenes and Forms

In her book The Memoir Project (2011), writer Marion Roach Smith gives the following ‘formula’ for understanding the art of the memoir.

It’s about x (a topic) as illustrated by y (scenes) to be told in a z (form).

This feels a little abstract. But what Smith is really saying is that a memoir needs the following:

• A theme, topic or thread running through it.
• A series of scenes, stories or incidents that throw light on this theme.
• A way of ordering these scenes or incidents into an overall shape or form.

Let’s look at these in turn.

The theme (or as Marion Roach Smith says, the topic ) of your memoir is what it is about.

Your life in general is not an ideal theme for a memoir, for all the reasons we have already discussed: it is too big, too untidy and too unordered to engage the reader.

So what does make a good theme? You could see a good theme as one that has two poles:

There is a universal pole, something that other people can grasp hold of and make sense of.

And then there is an individual pole, which is about how this theme plays out in the specific circumstances of your life.

Helen Macdonald’s H is for Hawk (2015) is about grief and the loss of her father. That’s the universal pole, something that all readers can relate to. But the individual pole is what makes this such a fascinating book: it is about how Macdonald works through grief by learning how to tame a goshawk.

A good theme, then, is something that people can immediately grasp and understand. It is the kind of thing that can be summed up in a sentence. “A story about how a writer works through the death of her father by taming a bird of prey.”

Once you have a theme, you can think about the best way of exploring it. What many memoir writers do at this stage is to gather together notes about specific scenes, incidents and stories that relate to this theme.

Memoirs are made up of multiple stories and scenes , all of which relate in some way to the central theme. So what are the stories that speak most strongly about the theme of your memoir? What are the scenes or the incidents that you remember most vividly, that you return to in your imagination again and again?

By scene , I mean accounts of things that actually happened, written with care for the specifics and the details, so that readers can experience them (live forwards through them) as they unfold.

Finally, there’s the question of form. How do you want to put all this material together? How do you want to shape it? Memoirs may be chronological and orderly. They may be complex and disordered. They may be told with all the close, focussed intensity of a 19th century novel. Or they may be more spacious, made up of hints, fragments and clues.

There really are no rules (other than “does this work?” — the hardest rule of all to follow, because you don’t know until you try — and sometimes not even then!). Memoirs don’t even have to be prose. Maybe you want to write a film script, a series of poems, or produce something collaged with words and images.

Making a Soufflé

Let’s take an example. Imagine you want to write a mini-memoir about how you came to understand failure through trying to bake the perfect soufflé.

The theme here has a universal theme or topic (failure) that will interest readers, and an individual pole (your disastrous attempts at soufflé-making).

Once you have this theme or topic, you can think about the scenes that you might write about. You can even make a list, for example:

• The first soufflé you ever ate
• How you cried when you burned the almost-perfect soufflé you made.
• How you fell in love with soufflé (and fell in love with X at the same time)
• Your fear of failure in school cooking classes
• How your parents instilled the fear of failure in me
• The time when, having given up on your ambition, you ate a soufflé prepared by an expert, and realised at last you were okay with failure

You can start writing these one-by-one, exploring these aspects of your experience.

Finally, you can start to give these stories an overall form . How do you want to piece these scenes together to tell an overall story? Do you want the writing to be chronological? Fragmentary? Do you want to satrt at the end (with failure) and go back to the beginning? Do you want to write it in prose, in poetry, as a graphic novel?

Homework Assignment

There is one piece of homework this time. This is also your first mini-assignment, to write a mini-memoir.

Start with a universal theme that interests you: something that all human beings, or almost all human beings, might experience at some time or other. Here are some themes that, if they are not universal, are very close to being, so you can choose one of these if you like!

The experience of social awkwardness.

The experience of grief.

The experience of failure.

The experience of desire.

The longing to be somewhere you are not.

The desire to find a place where you belong.

Now you have a theme, think about what you want to say about it, or what you want to explore. What do you want to say about grief, or desire, or awkwardness? This can be quite simple. For example, you might want to write a piece that explores how grief is different and unique to each individual person. Or you might want to write about how social awkwardness is okay, perhaps even a good thing. Make a couple of notes.

When you’ve done this, write down two or three scenes (memories / stories) from your life that you think will work as a way of exploring this theme. So it could be, for example (depending on the theme) the last time you saw your grandmother, or the time the kitten smashed your mobile phone, or when you got lost in the forest — or anything at all, as long as it is a way of exploring this theme.

Think about form : how do you want to tell these scenes/memories/stories? In what order will you share these scenes/memories/stories? How are you going to organise your writing?

When you’ve had a think about all this, then you are ready to write your mini-memoir. As you write, make sure you keep your plan on hand, and resist the temptation to wander off the point. Keep the focus as tight as possible.

If we get time in the session, we’ll start working on the writing now, to give you a head-start!

Remember: This time, upload your mini-memoir assignment to Canvas. Your deadline is the end of Monday ICT! You should write between 300 and 500 words, no more!

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