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In praise of independent publishing
May. 2nd, 2021 03:57 pmLately I've been thinking more seriously about writing my memoirs. I feel I have plenty of material to work with - the issue is more one of selection.
When we are living the day-to-day mundanities of our lives, there is so much that we take for granted. It doesn't occur to us at the time that anyone else would be interested in the sorts of things we do every day or every week. But looking back, how different our own school days were from those of our children and grandchildren! How different were people's views back then on child safety (or for that matter safety in general), free time, mothers going out to work (or not), fathers going out to work (or not) and so on. The toys we played with, the games we played in the school playground, the music we listened to, the TV we watched (and even if we had TV, the selection was limited), the school's (and the family's) stance on corporal punishment and detentions, smoking in the washrooms or elsewhere, drinking and drugs, sex and gender, school-sponsored clubs, sports and social activities and the sorts of careers we thought we might want or be able to aspire to.
Then there are the ethical aspects of talking about other people who have come into our lives over the years. We don't want to embarrass them or break any confidences. Do we somehow anonymize them or use pseudonyms for them or just leave them out of the picture entirely? Or do we include everything in whatever excruciating detail we see fit, but leave instructions for our successors to the effect that nothing be released for publication until 20, 30, 40 or more years after we die? I don't really think there are any easy answers!
But for now, I'm taking a look at other people's memoirs. Memoirs of ordinary people who are not or were not particularly famous. And that has meant looking beyond the major publishers to smaller, independent presses.
One of the ones I picked was Between The Lines:
https://btlbooks.com/
For starters, I picked out four memoirs with a feminist bent, by four different women of different ages and perspectives (although generally left-leaning, activist perspectives):
Waking Up in the Men's Room, by Catherine Macleod (who died very recently, in March of this year)
Resilience is Futile, by Julie S. Lalonde (with a particular emphasis on violence against women; in Ottawa, she is perhaps best known for the Hollaback! movement)
Fear, Love and Liberation in Contemporary Quebec, by Alexa Conradi, president of Fédération des Femmes du Québec
Feminist City: A Field Guide, by Leslie Kern, an academic now based at Mount Allison University in New Brunswick (While perhaps not strictly speaking a memoir, she definitely relates a great deal of her personal and lived experience and how it has all shaped her views on urban planning)
All of these books have made me think about how I should approach this project, which at the moment is really only a few short pieces and random and disorganized scrawlings...
When we are living the day-to-day mundanities of our lives, there is so much that we take for granted. It doesn't occur to us at the time that anyone else would be interested in the sorts of things we do every day or every week. But looking back, how different our own school days were from those of our children and grandchildren! How different were people's views back then on child safety (or for that matter safety in general), free time, mothers going out to work (or not), fathers going out to work (or not) and so on. The toys we played with, the games we played in the school playground, the music we listened to, the TV we watched (and even if we had TV, the selection was limited), the school's (and the family's) stance on corporal punishment and detentions, smoking in the washrooms or elsewhere, drinking and drugs, sex and gender, school-sponsored clubs, sports and social activities and the sorts of careers we thought we might want or be able to aspire to.
Then there are the ethical aspects of talking about other people who have come into our lives over the years. We don't want to embarrass them or break any confidences. Do we somehow anonymize them or use pseudonyms for them or just leave them out of the picture entirely? Or do we include everything in whatever excruciating detail we see fit, but leave instructions for our successors to the effect that nothing be released for publication until 20, 30, 40 or more years after we die? I don't really think there are any easy answers!
But for now, I'm taking a look at other people's memoirs. Memoirs of ordinary people who are not or were not particularly famous. And that has meant looking beyond the major publishers to smaller, independent presses.
One of the ones I picked was Between The Lines:
https://btlbooks.com/
For starters, I picked out four memoirs with a feminist bent, by four different women of different ages and perspectives (although generally left-leaning, activist perspectives):
Waking Up in the Men's Room, by Catherine Macleod (who died very recently, in March of this year)
Resilience is Futile, by Julie S. Lalonde (with a particular emphasis on violence against women; in Ottawa, she is perhaps best known for the Hollaback! movement)
Fear, Love and Liberation in Contemporary Quebec, by Alexa Conradi, president of Fédération des Femmes du Québec
Feminist City: A Field Guide, by Leslie Kern, an academic now based at Mount Allison University in New Brunswick (While perhaps not strictly speaking a memoir, she definitely relates a great deal of her personal and lived experience and how it has all shaped her views on urban planning)
All of these books have made me think about how I should approach this project, which at the moment is really only a few short pieces and random and disorganized scrawlings...
