Issue 16

As the memoir section in bookstores grows, June Lee asks the all-important question: why do we give a damn about Paris Hilton?

Everybody’s doing it – Lee Kuan Yew, Barack Obama, my taxi driver. But writing a memoir is more than just the ‘in’ thing to do – it can also be fairly lucrative, if the topic is juicy enough. The public’s voyeuristic, reality-TV-fuelled fascination with personal stories has never been more pronounced, which means everything from celebrity tell-alls to survival tales from war-torn countries reaches bestseller lists.

Consider the characteristics of a successful book: personal confessions of hard times (Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance, Obama, 1995), secrets revealed (Confessions of an Heiress: A Tongue-in-Chic Peek Behind the Pose, Paris Hilton, 2004), self-help tips without the pedantic seriousness of a self-help book (Winning Is Not Enough, Jackie Stewart, 2007), an inspirational climb to the top (Living History, Hillary Rodham Clinton, 2003), an insight into a life so unlike our own (Fidel Castro: My Life, Fidel Castro and Ignacio Ramonet, 2008).

One of the best-selling memoir genres is the celebrity exposé. Rather than wait for some hack to complete an unauthorised biography, many celebrities are now willing to collect the big publishing cheques themselves – with a little ghost-writing help, of course. When it comes to tell-alls, there are no rules. One-time British pop star Billie Piper revealed her Growing Pains (2006) at age 23, which became a surprise bestseller for its honest revelations (including details about her marriage to now-ex-husband Chris Evans and battles with the pop star-churning industry), but probably not for its wisdom.

Gently mature fans may appreciate Ronnie (Ronnie Wood, 2007), the eponymous autobiography by the Rolling Stones guitarist, by now a grandfather. Part of the fun, of course, is sieving through the exaggerations and deciding for yourself how much of the sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll were real. Wood, also an artist with his own gallery in London, distinguishes his memoir with some very creative doodles and photographs.

The other successful genre is the so-called ‘misery memoir’. Lucky (Alice Sebold, 2002) tells of the author’s rape as an 18-year-old, and how she subsequently brings her assailant to justice – and along the way, helps readers understand how she managed such insight and emotion in The Lovely Bones. Perhaps the popularity of memoirs like Lucky has something to do with the blurring of lines between the acceptable and the taboo. With these novels, people can give a voice to and identify with difficult stories about rape, depression and disease.

Following the success of Augusten Burroughs’ Running with Scissors (2006), each family member seems to have something to say, barring the alleged sociopath and now-deceased father, John Robison. Born Christopher Robison, Burroughs hated his father so much, he changed his name at 18 and wrote four darkly comedic memoirs about his childhood. The latest, A Wolf at the Table (2008), breaks from comedy to give a sinister biography of his father. Displaying a writing talent that rivals his brother’s, John Elder Robison has released a memoir about living with Asperger’s syndrome. Look Me in the Eye (2007) offers a tamer memory of their parents, plus a much-welcomed counterpoint to Burroughs’ satirical one-liners. The boys’ mother, Margaret Robison – described by both as mentally unstable – is also working on her own memoir.

Taking personal history to a different level, survivors of catastrophe can give context and insight to current events in their memoirs. God Grew Tired of Us (2007) is the story of John Bul Dau, a Lost Boy of Sudan. His anecdotes are harrowing, whether he’s recalling the escape from Sudan’s civil war or reflecting on living in his new homeland, America, where some Lost Boys screamed at the sight of escalators. In Pakistan, more humanitarian tales of courage are uncovered in Three Cups of Tea (2007) by mountaineer Greg Mortenson. Rescued by Pakistani villagers after a failed attempt to climb K2, Mortenson returns to eventually build more than 50 schools during the rise of the Taliban, in prose that is sometimes cringingly overwrought, but always heartfelt.


Where is the memoir genre headed? By any account, memoirs have gotten smarter and – for better or for worse – gimmicky. Take, for instance, the most charming Encyclopaedia of an Ordinary Life (2008) by Amy Krouse Rosenthal. Much like Seinfeld, writer Rosenthal gathers a quirky collection of anecdotes, quips and memories and arranges them alphabetically, summing up parts of her un-extraordinary life. Autobiography of a Wardrobe (2008) by Elizabeth Kendall, or purportedly by Kendall’s wardrobe, presents an even more original viewpoint. If clothes could talk, this is the story they would tell; part-memoir, part-fashion commentary, this is modern biography at its most chirpy.

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Fact or fiction?
In the days of ‘anything goes’, how can you tell if a memoir’s made up? Even publishers and Oprah Winfrey fall prey to fake true stories, costing them their reputation, sales and public trust. Here are some highprofile hoaxes.

A Million Little Pieces James Frey
Famously promoted and then vilified by Oprah in 2003, Frey wrote one of the best-selling misery memoirs in recent years. His tale of desperate addiction and alcoholism reeked of graphic bravado, which was eventually exposed as very creative fabrication. Frey’s original manuscript was rejected repeatedly, which may have prompted him to package it as a ‘true story’.

Love and Consequences Margaret B Jones
Released in February, this highly anticipated title was marketed as ‘a stunning memoir of a mixed-race girl growing up in gang-ridden South-Central Los Angeles, where she followed her foster brothers into the Bloods before she hit puberty.’ The real Margaret B Jones was neither a drug runner nor a half-Native American foster child; her name was Margaret Seltzer and she hung out at the mall in Sherman Oaks, a tiny California suburb. The book has been recalled.

Sarah JT LeRoy
A loosely termed memoir by JT LeRoy in 2000 propelled the author to fame, fuelling more books and eventually a movie based on ‘LeRoy’’s second novel, The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things. Billed as a 19-year-old debut author, ‘LeRoy’ presented a totally messed-up past as a transgender hooker and homeless drug abuser. The real author, Laura Albert, was exposed in early 2006 as being a white American author in her mid-thirties.