On Your Wedding Day
This letter to an ex posted on her wedding day by CBS legal analyst Andrew Cohen raises some interesting questions on public discourse, using your life in your writing, and intended readership.
His colleague Lizzie Skurnick calls him out. And the situation worsens. Salon.com offers a full wrap-up.
This would seem gossipy, but I really believe there’s a lot going on here that’s relevant to using people from your life in your writing, something every memoirist and personal essayist is going to do. More thoughts on this matter coming soon.
July 28th, 2010 at 4:02 pm
Pretty sure Cohen is on Team Edward. Am I wrong to think our memoirs and essays really shouldn’t read like “Twilight”?
July 28th, 2010 at 4:32 pm
Do you ever have that moment of horror right before a glass is about to fall off of a table, and you realize that nothing you can do can stop an inevitable shattering? That’s the feeling I got reading his title. Reading the actual column was an exercise in picking out the shards of glass from my eyes. Why? Why? It’s like, are you a legal analyst for CBS or a LiveJoural user?
July 29th, 2010 at 7:16 am
I think it’s hilarious that the guy talked about his “surprise divorce.”
Yeah, only a surprise to him because he was (and is) too self-absorbed and narcissistic to have seen it coming. God, what a total violation of an essay!!! And when called out on it, he still can’t see the error of his ways, instead turning it back on Skurnick in more eruptions of his narcissism. Yeesh!!!!
Recently I got wind of the fact that someone I was once disastrously involved with is writing a memoir. I have no idea whether anything about me will be in it, but I’ve already contacted a lawyer to explore my options in quashing any inclusion of my brief intersection with this person’s life.
Life, for many of us, is not “material” and we resent being thought of that way. And, in my opinion, it’s crucial to get a person’s permission before you include him or her in your work. EXCEPT for children, who in no way can give informed consent and should be protected from this kind of exposure by narcissistic parents (Ayelet Waldman and Annie Lamott, for egregious examples). Either that or wait until they and everyone in their family and all their friends are dead.
Obviously, a sentiment that won’t be popular here, I know. And I know a lot of great writing would not exist if my rules were enforced. Still, it’s ok for “you” to suffer for your art, but it’s not fair to make others suffer for it by writing about them w/o their permission. In my strong and probably illogical opinion.
July 29th, 2010 at 11:17 am
Hi Sarah,
It’s not that your comment isn’t valid, but you’d probably be talking about removing half of all great literature. There are steps people can take. For example, your ex could significantly change details to protect your identity so as long as you didn’t tell anyone no one would know it was you.
Stephen
July 29th, 2010 at 11:22 am
Sarah, you and my half-sister should go have drinks and chill out. My family was in complete turmoil for some time based on the fact that I didn’t ask my sister if she could be in my memoir. Here’s her complete appearance in the book: “I ask the oldest of my sisters if my mom is still fighting with Clyde. She is only 11 and looks perplexed, then later tells Mom what I said.”
I had friends who approached me while I was working on the book, not to tell me to leave them out, but to let me know it was alright to put what I needed about them in the book. Quite frankly I found this presumptuous and narcissistic. (And a little disturbing.) Most memoirs are about a particular moment in life and not everyone is a pivotal player. Don’t assume you’re in your ex’s book.
And to make an assumption that thousands of people read any given memoir or even care who the characters really are is a poor one. For the most part, no one cares about one more memoir and the real joy of a memoir is often the journey of self-discovery (good and bad) while working on it. And hopefully those who do read it will recognize and embrace that journey themselves. Maybe instead of worrying about your appearance and portrayal in his/her story, you can instead hope that it will be a transformative journey for him/her.(since it sounds like this person is a wreck)
Now on Cohen… I agree with every single point you make. The column had no value outside of being a piece of passive-aggressive schlock. What an ass.
July 29th, 2010 at 1:10 pm
First, I’m not assuming I’ll be in the memoir, or even if it will come to pass. I’m pretty much certain I don’t matter that much in the grand scheme of things – life has changed dramatically for both of us. However, the person has already written about it elsewhere and I’m not enthused about going through that again. Second, I’m not assuming thousands of people will be reading it and that’s not my main concern at all – I could care less. It’s that someone would exploit for personal gain (in any form, from emotional to $$) what was extremely personal and private. Third, I suppose details could be changed but if you’re going to do that, I say just write some fiction and work it out that way. Many memoirs are not all that anyway. Want a transformative journey? Try a journal, or, better yet, psychoanalysis. And notice that there are locks on diaries and doctor-client privilege for protecting not just diarists and docs, but vulnerable subjects and patients as well. In any case, your “transformative journey” could be someone else’s nightmare of re-living a past they’d already worked hard to transform into something they could live with without dragging you through it, so what makes it ok for you to do it to them *without permission*?
Last, I’m pretty sure we would lose a much smaller percentage than “half of all great literature” if I had my way. I still make the point that not everyone likes being considered “material,” in the moment or ex post facto. The internet makes this even more salient, as illustrated by this schmuck’s totally weird column. When you hit send, it’s forever. At least in book form it can end up forgotten in remainders.
Look, I’m obviously someone with strong opinions, and I’m not exactly a fan of prior restraint. Exploitation is as exploitation does and it might mean different things to different people, that’s all. If publishing something is more important than maintaining good relationships or honoring past private interactions, there’s a ton of precedent for you; for my position, not so much. Can’t help how I feel, though.