An autobiography is a record of a life.
A story's catalyst is a specific incident that illuminates the occasion of the telling and sets the story in motion.
Conflict occurs when someone wants something that he or she doesn't get or when a character is blocked.
The denotative meaning of a word is its dictionary meaning; the connotative meaning includes implied characteristics found in the word's context.
In a sentence or utterance, diction refers to the choice of words and style of enunciation.
Dominant images and sustaining metaphors gather momentum as the story moves forward, like the proverbial snowball rolling down the hill. Through accretion of key images and metaphors, mood and tone are set by the writer and communicated to the reader. See also scaffolding.
Dramatic structure organizes both scenes and the larger work into a coherent whole that moves forward from its opening moment. (1) The catalyst is the moment in time at which a scene begins to move. (2) The conflict involves the oppositions, internal or external, facing the protagonist. (3) The rising action deepens the oppositions the protagonist faces. (4) The climax is a scene's epiphanic moment—the turn, the shift, the pivot point. (5) The denouement provides closure.
The emblematic moment is an image or complex of images metaphorical of a larger truth in the story.
Emblematic scenes not only highlight a particular moment but represent the memoir's larger themes as well, moving the action forward while also serving as microcosms and metaphors for the larger work.
An epiphany is a moment of realization or heightened awareness that can lead to change in the protagonist.
The experiencing self refers to the author in the past.
Imagery refers to the sensory details of sound, taste, and smell as well as the visual details that provide the reader with an experiential quality.
Implied author refers to the imagined person behind the narrative voice of a work as opposed to the actual author of that work. The implied author is created, just as the work itself is.
A leitmotif is a complex metaphor layered into the story; it builds associations around a person, place, or thing.
A memoir is an exploration of a significant time in a life using narrative strategies to create a dynamic story.
A metaphor connects two unrelated things and creates a relationship between them. The phrase “the chasm of despair,” for example, lends an emotional tone and a physical image to an abstract noun.
Milieu refers to the social environment and often the ambience of a setting. It can reference a historical time as well as the values of an era or an author.
The occasion of the telling answers the question, Why is this story being told now?
Plot is the dramatic sequencing of events in your story.
Point of view refers to the assumed eyes and ears of the “person” telling a story. In the case of memoir, this is almost always you.
A memoir’s preface often connects the two yous.
A reliable narrator appears to have a perspective in line with the values in the story and is someone the reader trusts to have a balanced view of the story.
The remembering self refers to the author in the present.
Reversals are unexpected events that send the narrative in a new direction.
Scaffolding refers to the metaphoric connections of disparate events in a story to create a larger, more resonant meaning.
Scenes are moments in motion whose developing action (internal or external) engages and keeps the reader’s interest.
Sensory cues employ a scent, taste, or touch to trigger a flashback.
We use the term speaker or narrator when we discuss the voice that relates to a memoir in order to distance the writer from his or her characters, even or especially when the writer is a character.
Story arc refers to the movement among the elements of dramatic structure that form a narrative. See also dramatic structure.
Structure is the framework that contains your story (and includes plot). (1) In an associative structure, the scenes are linked by a quality, a mood, a connection. This structure feels “natural,” as memory itself arises from such cues or triggers. (2) In a chronological structure, events unfold in linear time. (3) In a circular structure, a key or catalyzing incident serves as an anchor for the story; the narrator returns to it again and again. (4) A collage structure juxtaposes discrete events against one another; the reader fills in the gaps, making meaning by forging connections between events that seem unrelated. (5) A locational structure uses place or setting to ground the various segments of the narrative. (6) A parallel structure contrasts two time periods and often two people, creating deeper meaning via a rich, parallel narrative.
Style refers to the sound of the voice on the page: its tone, rhythm, and way of speaking.
Subtext exists beneath the surface of the story and is shown via detail, dialogue, and scene, revealing (in Charles Baxter’s words) its “chronic tensions.”
A symbol refers to a word or concept developed through context and layered by repetition so that it takes on larger meaning.
Syntax refers to the arrangement of the words in a sentence or utterance.
Time is telegraphed in narrative by the following elements: (1) A scene takes place in actual time. Because it contains largely dialogue with minimal reaction, the pacing of a scene reflects the amount of time that such an interchange might actually take. (2) A summary is a collapsing of time, as in “four years later…” The writer makes a transition to let the reader know where he or she is in time, but the brief mention of time is vastly shorter than the chronicling of “four years” or whatever chunk of time the writer is referencing. (3) A description expands time. The writer may linger on a moment that in the thinking could be a flash but that in the telling is leisurely. Description arrests time and allows for psychological detail as well.
Tone refers to the overall mood of a story or a scene. It is the emotional coloring a writer creates through language, events, and rhythm.
The two yous refers to you, the remembering self, now, and you, the experiencing self, then.
An unreliable narrator deceives himself or the reader—his view of events does not mesh with the “facts” of what really happened. An unreliable narrator forces the reader to decide for herself what the story’s truth really is.
Voice refers to the sound of the narrator on the page. More nuanced and sophisticated than your regular speaking voice, your voice on the page is the you who can best tell this story.