💬 What are your favorite qualities in a memoir or personal essay?

What gives you the ick? Weigh in on our monthly(ish) community prompt

“Autobiography is only to be trusted when it reveals something disgraceful. A man who gives a good account of himself is probably lying, since any life when viewed from the inside is simply a series of defeats.”

—George Orwell
(Opening epigraph of restaurateur Keith McNally’s book, I Regret Almost Everything)

Photo by Andrew Neel on Unsplash

Catch up on parts one and two of the “All the Way to the Memoir” series:

📕 All the Way to the Memoir, Part One

From my recent understanding, having only studied memoir closely as a category for the last two years (and much to my regret, not at all before that, as I was too buried in boring business books), it seems the genre has been derided by critics since its earliest days as navel-gazing; useless, selfish, self-centered, drivel glorifying minutiae under a magnifying glass, or barring that, serving up salacious tea from celebrities.

Same for its close cousin, the personal essay—which rose anew with blogging and then social media, a “first-personal industrial complex” emboldened by the internet.

For some of my favorite podcasts about writing, including better understanding these two categories, check out this list »

But those of us who devour these books and essays, who crave them, who feel seen and emboldened and reassured by them, know this criticism is beside the point. For me, especially these last few years, these categories have been a lifeline thrown into choppy seas, saying, “Here, grab this—my story will help pull you through.”

In parts one and two of the recent “All the Way to the Memoir” series, I shared my fascination with Elizabeth Gilbert’s latest book and podcast tour, and The Discourse™ surrounding it. On Barnes & Noble’s Poured Over podcast, she explained how telling her story seems part of her spiritual assignment, and why it might not be as “raw” as everyone seems to think (emphasis mine):

“Those feelings that come inside, especially when you’re sitting in the dark at night and all of your worst possible thoughts appear—we all have the same ones, I think—so often we all come to the same places. Sometimes it takes reading it in a book or hearing someone else who you think has their life together to say the same thing, to feel like, oh, maybe, maybe there’s something there.

I’m always happy to volunteer to be that person, you know? And I feel like it’s actually maybe my job, that my job is to be a writer, but I think maybe my spiritual job, it appears that my spiritual job is to go through universal human experiences that are incredibly frightening and terrifying and then learn my way up out of it, and then take what I learned and share it by using my own life, opening up my own life.

There have been a lot of questions that I’ve been getting lately because this book is so raw. Like raw is the word people are using to describe it, but I think it’s actually cooked. I actually think that I was raw, and then I got well, and now it’s cooked. And that’s why I can serve it to you. Like, I don’t want to serve you raw food.”

Are we ever fully healed or stories perfectly cooked? I doubt it, but that discussion is for another day.

With all that preamble, building on our earlier monthly(ish) Community Doh discussion threads, I’d love to hear from you in the comments:¹

💬 What qualities are present in your favorite memoirs or personal essays? What gives you the ick?

P.S. For powerful prompts and examples on writing a personal essay, check out

Mallary Tenore Tarpley

’s post, “10 questions to help spark personal essay ideas.”²

10 questions to help spark personal essay ideas

Note: These are usually for paid subscribers only, so fellow Dohnuts can feel more secure in sharing, knowing the stories and comments aren’t publicly searchable. Today, comments are open, so I would love for you to join us!

1. 🍩 View earlier discussion prompts—and weigh in any time, it’s never too late!—here:

💬 Community Doh: Discussion Prompts

2. 📖 Don’t miss these memoir-related Substacks (and let me know if I’m missing any!):

• Memoir Land

• Memoiring Book Club

• Let's Talk Memoir

• Memoir Nation

• Glamorous Trash
  (on celebrity memoirs)

• Open Secrets
  (an online magazine for personal essays)

• Memoir Magazine

👉 If you enjoyed this post, you might also appreciate:

🧱Rebuilding from Rubble

🍽️ "The Dinner Party," Part One

💬 How do you collect stories and ideas? 🐿️

💬 What gives you the courage to hit publish on vulnerable work?

🎧 Listen to the Rolling in Doh Podcast Playlist