Personal Essays by the (Baker's) Dozen
Welcome to Memoir Land—a newsletter now featuring three verticals:
Memoir Monday, a weekly curation of the best personal essays from around the web brought to you by Narratively, The Rumpus, Granta, Guernica, Oldster Magazine, Literary Hub, Orion Magazine, The Walrus, and Electric Literature. (Plus an associated quarterly reading series hosted by Lilly Dancyger.)
First Person Singular, featuring original personal essays. Recently I published “Tell Me, What Do You Think About You?” by
.(***Submissions for First Person Singular are now PAUSED. An overwhelming number of new submissions have recently come in. There are more essays in my inbox than I could publish in two years. And I’m too overwhelmed to keep bringing in more to read before I go through all those already in there, even with help from recently appointed contributing editor Katie Kosma.
*Going forward, there will be specific limited submission periods, which I will announce here. You can find submissions guidelines and more on the “About” page, but, again, submissions are currently PAUSED.)
The Lit Lab, featuring interviews and essays on craft and publishing. It is primarily for paid subscribers. Recently I published an interview with author and Cheryl Strayed's Dear Sugaradvice columnist
.
Essays from partner publications…
On Trans Joy
by Rafael Frumkin
“I have a doppelgänger who’s also a ghost. Once, I went where she went, did what she did, but she and I have since parted ways. Now she’s a diaphanous specter. I’m flesh and blood.”
The Cloud Factory
by Graeme Armstrong
“There’s this photograph ae us at Christmas. Ma granny is wearin a wee sparkly blue cardigan wae hur hair aw done nice. A’m lyin on a chair next tae hur, wearin white trackies n a black polo shirt wae the collar up, in a total state. This look hud become semi-permanent. A stayed oot aw night wae the young mavis, stood ootside the Orange Hall, drinkin Buckfast oot oor nuts on ekto pills. Ma maw wis annoyed cos she didnae want ma gran tae know aboot the violence, drugs n madness. A hud awready been expelled fae Airdrie Academy n turned up regularly wae broken teeth n black eyes. Ma eld gran wisnae daft. That wis wan ae hur last wae us. Ma maw got me a card that said, christmas is a time when you want your past forgotten and your present remembered. A laughed but felt bad aboot it. Ma lovin family wur collateral damage tae aw this.”
Stripping Back the Mother-Daughter Relationship… at Magic Mike Live in Vegas
by Connie Wang
“tried to call her bluff: Would she be interested in seeing the live show in Vegas that Tatum was producing? She would say no, I expected—of course she would say no. Magic Mike XXL is a movie about strippers stripping; naturally, this live show would be of men, stripping. I almost choked when she said yes, and nonchalantly suggested April for our trip.”
Being an Honorary White Person Doesn’t Make Us More Powerful
by Frankie Huang
“It almost feels as if Beef is a show within a show, so darkly comical are Choe, Lee, Wong, and Yeun’s doomed bad decisions as they desperately try to protect Beef’s mainstream success as a vehicle for representation while ignoring their critics, many of whom belong to the groups they seek to represent. There are those who believe that mainstream crossover success of celebrities of color among Hollywood circles eventually trickles down to better the lives of the rest of us. However, that doesn’t account for the collateral damage that comes with the trickle down.”
The House that Mom Built
by Anubha Momin
“My mother’s layouts match what I’ve heard of her childhood home, in Bangladesh, where her father would regularly host colleagues from the UN or his tennis-club buddies. Her recollections are full of festivities and gaiety, busy memories that are so different from my own adolescence. She doesn’t seem to realize, even as we visit Frank Lloyd Wright’s famous houses, that, like the iconic architect, she may be arranging her abode not for current needs but to evoke an idea of a model household—one informed by the home she left behind.”
My Blue Period
by Kristine Lloyd
“I left Seattle, where I’d lived for 14 years, drove cross-country to Birmingham, Alabama, and moved back into my childhood bedroom…It seemed like the perfect time to dye my hair blue.”
My Mother’s Transplants
by Lisa Lee Herrick
“Driving back from my parents’ house, I watched endless rows of Callery pears and ginkgo bilobas blur past my window—the same trees that make my city look like your city—and noted that they, too, were from Asia. Non-native, dislocated, thriving, but popular. Aren’t weeds simply plants we don’t know?”
Tell Me, What Do You Think About You?
by
“I grew up believing other women’s success diminished mine. I had been trained to hide in the psychic bathroom and whisper in my mind, ‘Stop making me look bad. There’s not enough light to go around.’ I was embarrassed by my collusion with the idea of scarcity.”
Essays from around the web…
The Secret Friend Who Helped Me End My Marriage
by Kelly McMasters
“I wondered where imaginary friends might vacation. I thought of my own imaginary friend, who was tall and lean and blond. I’d named him Heathcliff, because I thought of him as part Wuthering Heights character and part Michael Penn song, a Romeo in black jeans.”
Playing Piano (Badly) Relieved Me of Perfectionism
by Anna Rollins
“Even though I often followed the notes set out on sheet music, sometimes I let the melodies lead me. My son would play notes in bass, pushing keys with fleshy fists, and I would search for sounds to provide some accompaniment. As I became more devoted to this practice, I realized that piano gave me relief from my amygdala-led processes. It allowed me to be truly embodied. With vibration, I could make an impression rather than a hard mark. The stakes felt low and inviting.”
Smoke on the Water: How I Survived Catholic High School in the Seventies
by Mark Coleman
“Another repercussion occurred that knocked me sideways, something I’ve never forgotten, and yet can’t believe ever happened. The Cincinnati Enquirer sports section ran a full page of letters denouncing me as a symbol of 'what’s gone wrong with the permissive modern liberal era' and so on…[W]hy would anyone take time out of their busy life to write a letter to the editor about some stupid teenager getting kicked off a sports team for smoking a cigarette? Right or wrong, at that moment I decided — or realized — that my future pointed somewhere beyond Cincinnati, Ohio.”
A Writer Apologized to Me — 23 Years Later. A ‘Waterfall’ of Memories Ensued
by Deborah Vankin
“23 years ago I profiled author and New Yorker writer Thomas Beller. Things did not go well! He was terrible to me -- and that became the gist of the story. I never saw him again. Until now -- when he reached out to me last week to apologize. The curious, two-decades-later apology sent me spiraling into a black hole of nostalgia. And my resulting piece, in which I interview Beller as to why he reached out now, also addresses our evolving creative selves, the shrinking alternative media and cash-strapped publishing business, as well as "purity of intent" and, ultimately, forgiveness.”
Vivian
by Wendy Mages
“They met when they were each surreptitiously breaking a school rule; each was taking a child to the cafeteria to buy a carton of milk. They weren’t supposed to buy food for the children, but working with hungry children was heartbreaking and hungry children have difficulty focusing. So, Mom and Vivian did what they believed was necessary so the children could benefit from the therapy they needed and deserved. After that, the two renegades became fast friends.”
🚨Announcements:
📢 Attention essayists: Electric Literature is launching a creative nonfiction program! Learn more about it in a free salon tomorrow, May 16th at 3pm EST, hosted by Mount St. Mary’s University. Tune in to hear EL’s essay editors, editor-in-chief Denne Michele Norris, associate editor Wynter Miller, and contributing editor Michelle Chikaonda in conversation to learn more about their new submission guidelines and more. Submissions will be open from June 1-15…
📢 From Writing Class Radio: Join our First Draft writing group! We take personal essays and then break them down, so you understand how to write a great personal essay on your own. Tuesdays 12-1 (ET) and/or Wednesdays 7-8 (ET). You'll write to a prompt and share (if you want)
📢 Attention Publications and writers interested in having published essays considered for inclusion in our weekly curation:
By Thursday of each week, please send to memoirmonday@gmail.com:
The title of the essay and a link to it.
The name of the author, and the author’s Twitter handle.
A paragraph or a few lines from the piece that will most entice readers.
Because of data limits for many email platforms, going forward we will only include artwork from our partner publications. No need to send art.
*Please be advised, however, that we cannot accept all submissions, nor respond to the overwhelming number of emails received. Also, please note that we don’t accept author submissions from our partner publications.
You can also support Memoir Monday—and indie bookstores!—by browsing this Bookshop.org list of every book that’s been featured at the Memoir Monday reading series. It’s a great place to find some new titles to add to your TBR list!