Inspiration in Memoirs, Mao's last Dancer. Learn about other cultures.



What an incredible story! What an incredible life. Many of you may have seen the movie "Mao's Last Dancer," but how many of you have read the 500 page book memoir of Li Cunxin? It is absolutely inspirational. What a motivated, brave, and courageous youth.

But what I loved even more than the story itself was learning first hand from someone who lived and experienced the culture of China during a time of enormous chaos and change. In his early years he lived in rural china with his large close knit family practicing the centuries old traditions of his land (He tells us about those traditions.). He talks about what he and his family and friends felt and experienced as the old traditional culture crumbled and Mao's communist party took over and ruled. And where the culture is now. He shows us how deep his need for freedom was and what he had to do to realize that dream.

As a part of Madame Mao's new project for the arts, Li was taken out of his home at the age of eleven and relocated to Beijing where he studied ballet. Except for a short time at home most summers he spent the next years groomed in the communist party. Over time he became a famous dancer both in China and in America.

And here is the wonder of memoir. Sure, I've read history books and even learned about different cultures from books and TV shows. History is interesting but it is written from an observer's position. It is his story not mine. No outsider could have truly known what that period in China's history was really like for the people living it. Others can write about it but they can only imagine and tell what they see from their perspective.

As the world grows ever smaller and we long to live in peace with all cultures and peoples, it is essential that we learn and experience who they truly are through their eyes, not ours. It is only then that we can empathize with each other and gain compassion for everyone. Memoirs that incorporate the experience, the thoughts, and the strong emotions, as well as the spiritual beliefs the author lives by. They provide us with the 3-D pictures of the past that we can get in no other way. And that is why I am writing the stories as told to me by my father when they escaped Russia in 1924. How about you? Is there something in your life you need to write about?

Keepsakes: Keep a Few

My mother recently passed away.  She was 85 and the matriarch of our large family of six children, 20 grandchildren and 28 (and counting) great-grandchildren.  My dad has been left kind of bewildered and lost.  “I was supposed to go first,” he says, “I don’t know what to do with everything.”

My mom did not hold on to “things.”  Oh, she had her collections of eagles, American flag pins and milk glass – but other things she threw away with great sense of purpose.  She did not like clutter or sentimental junk.  Our schoolwork, craft projects, outgrown clothes, old toys and games were thrown away without fanfare.

I guess she came by this habit naturally, having grown up in rooming houses with her grandmother.  She moved often and lived in small quarters.  Her married life wasn’t much different.  We continued to move from town to town as our family grew.  We moved once a year for six years in a row, following construction jobs around the Northwest.  She became expert at throwing things out so that the belongings of our family of seven could fit into one small moving van.  Out it went.

But it hurt when she threw away gifts that we made especially for her, like the pillowcases I spent many hours embroidering and the appliquéd placemats and table linens that I sewed for her one year.  And it wasn’t just gifts.  She threw away cards, letters, announcements and programs.  She deleted projects, programs and photos from her computer the instant she thought she was done with them; often creating frantic calls for help when she discovered she needed something that had disappeared from her recycle bin which she emptied regularly.  “Get rid of it,” was her motto.

It drove me crazy.  I could not understand how she could throw away the things that tug at heartstrings – those cards and letters and little pieces of written words that tell the story of our lives.  A few years ago she even threw out a poem she wrote about her five daughters that we all loved.  My sister Norma copied it in calligraphy and decoupaged it onto a plaque in the 70s.  One day it was gone off the wall.  Just gone.   

That is why the manila envelope my father handed me last weekend came as such a surprise.  Dad had discovered a large envelope of “things” stuffed in among her hundreds of files of carefully catalogued and recorded genealogical records.  Inside he found bits and pieces from each of us: a valentine from Mike, a poem from me, a birthday card from Debby, a letter from Norma, a map from Becky (showing where to find her one day when she ran away from home) and a hand-drawn picture from Donna. 

  

There weren’t many, and some were yellowed and falling apart, wrinkled or twisted – but there they were.  Some were taped to copy paper and others written on notebook paper or old stationary – but there they were. 

And, they are wonderful.  We laughed and cried and read them to one another.  The good memories flooded in on the wings of misspelled words and childish scrawls.  I know experts say to throw out clutter and not to get emotionally attached to “things.”  But hand written or drawn “things” help tell your story and I think you should hang on to just a few – like my mom.

The Antagonists

As I have been working on a novel based largely on my early life, I am now at the point of beginning again for the third draft. To give myself a clear direction forward, I asked a few writers to take a look at my unwieldy manuscript and weigh in. When you find two or three people in complete agreement, a rare enough occurrence in real life, you have a pretty strong sense of where the structure of the story may be lacking. Writing from real experience can be quite maddening, as the events of anyone's life do not fall into the lines of story structure. Even in straight memoir form, even if you have had the most fascinating life imaginable, you would still need something of a dramatic arc in order to carry the story forward. While  I have filled five hundred pages  full of snippets of memory, it has been made clear that I need to fix something in the structure.

After much tossing, turning, casting about and questioning the fates, the answer came to me late at night when I asked Google for help. I found a blog, very much like this one, where a writer tried to process a constant piece of criticism she faced with alarming regularity from friends and agents alike. Her stories were too nice, she was told, about nice people and that her writing lacked conflict. The woman went on to describe how she avoids conflict in real life, and like me, turns herself inside out and backwards to give other people their way rather than face down any transgressors. Bingo, I thought. This is me.

Upon further reflection, I realized that I had no desire to create an antagonist in any of my fiction. I would rather not spend my time thinking about people compelled to make themselves into a veritable roadblock. To tell you the truth, in my own life, I consider those types, and there doesn't seem to be any shortage of them, to be avoided at all costs. While most are well meaning and tend to question whether any course of action has been thought through well enough, for their liking at least, it still drives me crazy to be second guessed.  After all, I think I do enough of that for myself.

 In taking an existing true story, as was the case with my novel entitled, My American Eden, I did not have this problem as the antagonist came with the territory. It was the Puritan minister, the man who preached to the first citizens of Boston on board the Arabella, headed to the new world, where they were about to have a second chance at paradise who distrusted women and feared a second Eve would be their undoing. Believing God would not be merciful a second time, under his theocratic jurisdiction, women were tied to the whipping post, stripped to the waist and thrashed. When that did not exert enough control, he fined, jailed and then executed those who disagreed with him. Tying his own handkerchief over the face of my heroine as she willing faced her execution, he was her antagonist to the bitter end.  In a story based on the true events of my childhood, a person in complete opposition to me is harder to come by.  The answer will have to  spring from my imagination and it is this conundrum that has me up in the middle of the night.

If you feel that your story is starting to sag in the middle, not gaining in momentum, or lacking a certain zing, take a look at your protagonist and put more obstacles in his or her path. The protagonist has to want something, and the antagonist has to stand in the way. That is the long and the short of it. Get every rejected work out of the drawer, cupboard or filing cabinet and look at it through this lens. You'd be surprised at what a good, old fashioned Snidely Whiplash kind of character can do for your story. 

Setting Up A Space for Writing Memoirs

Our guest blogger, Joan Hust, is sharing how to make the ideal setting for writing your memoirs. Her background will make for a best selling memoir. She attended 25 elementary schools by 5th grade, earned university degrees in elementary and secondary education, business administration and library science. She continues to take several classes a year.

Joan's work resume is enviable: taught K-junior college classes, ESL and numerous courses at the Theological College of Central Africa in Ndola, Zambia and led safaris for nine years there. She wrote and produced TV shows for children and women and ran a printing company, "Printing for Jesus". She served as the librarian in DeArmond Library in Coeur d'Alene, ID. She credits her mother who read aloud encyclopedias during car trips, and faith in the Lord. Now Joan travels on missions to start or add to libraries to Guatemala, Cuba, China India and Africa. She lives in Coeur d'Alene with her husband and one of their three children.

Joan is an prolific writer. She has written numerous articles (travel, religious, health oriented, learning in all forms) for a variety of sources. I read her articles frequently in the IWL newsletter and the newspaper "Goodwill." Joan's interesting web site is Writer's Roost (http//writersroost.org). Thank you, Joan, for this guest post. Here is Joan when she isn't writing or traveling.

Every writer has a favorite place where they like to write. Some are most fortunate and have a room of their own or a place they have made for themselves under the upstairs steps.

All writing areas should have the basics: thermos of coffee, tea or water, tissues, pens and paper, computer or typewriter, waste paper basket, dictionary and extra cartridge of toner for the printer.

Biography writers will need inspiring memorabilia:

* Photographs, posters or postcard paintings of the subject of the biography.

* Items which relate to the subject such as an elephant wood carving from Africa

* Other biographies on the subject

* Reference guides to the times, cultures or places of the subject

* Newspaper and magazine articles

Autobiography writers will need some more personal items:

* Boxes and albums of family photos

* Contact numbers of relatives for help in remembering names and dates

* A notebook for writing down dates and times

* Diaries or journals

* Autobiography software

* Birth, marriage and death certificates

* Diploma and degree certificates

* Newspaper clippings (birth announcements, etc)

* School photos

* A cork board, push pins and cards to write thoughts and memories on

* Collectables from the life being written about figurines, badges, tickets from events attended

Memoirs often call to mind the exact emotions of the exact time in the individual's life. Photographs of that same time in your life:

* Wedding bouquet, childhood toys

* Pictures and items that bring to mind the emotions most common in the memoir

* Music, Perfumes, Scents to suggest memories

* Books and movies that bring back memories

For the writers that do not have a special writing room or corner it is ok. Here are a few ways to have a practical writing space:

* Have a bag or suitcase to keep your writing materials

* Have a computer desktop that has links to all of your inspiration music, scan in your family photos, use journaling or autobiography software

* Give yourself time every day to browse the internet for information and inspiration.

Limit Distractions

* If it is the internet turn it off. It can be very distracting.

* Don't listen to music if it sidetracks you.

* Get inspired and that