leave him alone
First Augusten Burroughs, now this.
Memoirs don’t have to be to-the-letter perfect accounts of someone’s past. If that were possible, the only good memoir writers would have photographic memories. They would have to remember the dialogue in every single conversation they have ever had. They would also have to remember details about the people whose lives have become intertwined with theirs. After all, if Aunt Jane wore a red hat to church every Sunday, but you remembered it as purple, then you’d be doing a disservice to Aunt Jane, wouldn’t you?
No, not really, but The Smoking Gun would like to think so.
What TSG seems to have missed in all of this is that James Frey is a memoir writer, not a journalist. As more than one writing teacher of mine has said, creative non-fiction is 95% truth and 5% fiction. It’s an art form, not a form of reporting.
I suppose the only literary crime James Frey has committed is not stating the literary definition of a memoir. Perhaps he could have done that in his foreword to spell it out plainly for gotcha-happy people like the folks at TSG.
He can also be blamed, I guess, for becoming too famous and too rich too fast. Blame Oprah for having an out-of-control iconic status among millions of sheep who flock to her to tell them what’s good — to read, buy, see, watch, listen to, eat, drink, poop in — but don’t blame Frey. He was just trying to get a book published.
books, pop culture | sighclub January 10, 2006