The Situation and the Story: The Art of Personal Narrative

by Vivian Gornick

Book Overview

A guide to the art of personal writing, by the author of Fierce Attachments and The End of the Novel of Love

All narrative writing must pull from the raw material of life a tale that will shape experience, transform event, deliver a bit of wisdom. In a story or a novel the I who tells this tale can be, and often is, an unreliable narrator but in nonfiction the reader must always be persuaded that the narrator is speaking...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0374528586
• ISBN13: 9780374528584
• Release Date: October 2002
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.1" x 7.5"

Customer Reviews

Made me want to get back to writing

Gornick manages to analyze exactly what makes a personal essay successful without sounding didactic or sentimental. I'm not surprised, as she is a terrific writer herself. She uses examples of pieces and excerpts from well-known and not-so-well known writers. For anyone who has written creative non-fiction and hasn't always known what to do to improve their work, Gornick offers an unusual way of looking at things, an interesting combination of intuitive and analytical. If you are new to writing, she offers suggestions on how to read other writers, and what to look for. I would add this to "Bird by Bird," by Anne Lamott, as excellent and inspiring books for writers.

write it right- the Gornick way

The Situation and the Story although easy to follow is a tough read. Gornick's book tells how to read memoirs as well as how to write them. She strives for the highest standards and lays great responsiblity on the wrier's shoulders. Beyond just relating a good story that happens to be true, Gornick expects the writer to impart wisdomto the reader gained by the writerfrom the act of writing the memoir. If the writer didn't gain wisdom, t she probably shouldn't write the memoir. For serious memoirist the book is a must read, and reread, and reread.

A book that deserves the stature of its author

Vivian Gornick writes beautifully, whether she's writing about love, politics, or the craft of writing. The Situation and the Story is based on her many years of teaching creative writing and focuses on ways of making nonfiction personal without wallowing in self-absorption. In other words, it helps writers discover where the 'universal truth,' the essence of Story, is in the millions of anecdotes in our lives.As an author and writing teacher, I've found this book invaluable and have read it several times. My copy is well thumbed and appropriately coffee-stained.

Thoughtful discussion, beautifully written

Vivian Gornick invariably delights me, whether in her memoir, Fierce Attachments, her occasional essays in various journals, her book about reading, or this new one, which gave me a lot to think about.The Situation and the Story focuses on essay and memoir-writing. Rather than trying to cover a lot of ground superficially, Gornick lays out one main idea and explores it in depth, using a wide variety of examples to illustrate her ideas. It was particularly helpful to have long excerpts from these examples, so I could really get a sense of the essay or memoir being discussed. She deals most intelligently with the question of the narrator -- the narrator's "persona" on the page, and the relationship of the narrator to her/his material.As someone who writes and teaches memoir, I found this extremely helpful, but it will be equally interesting to anyone who writes or reads narrative nonfiction and wants to think seriously about it.It is a great relief to find a book about writing that has gracefully sidestepped every pitfall of the advice genre. Gornick's style is respectful: she expects her readers to be as serious and smart about literature as she is herself and, even if we're not, we can always find a lot to think about in her work.

The Situation and The Story

The Situation and the Story, by Vivian Gornick is immensely entertaining while adapting an educational prose designed to enhance awareness of "self" as narrator. She uses excellent examples of non-fiction narratives that serve to further the invitation of speculation through tone, syntax, and perspective. The self as a persona is developed using wonderful writers such as Joan Didion, Oscar Wilde, and Edmond Gosse. Vivian Gornick breaks down the writing barrier and gets right to the contents of human emotion. We are what we write, and our personal truths are conveyed in our words. She does a fabulous job taking a stand against the "boring, agitated" self and replaces that with the truth speaker who can move an essay forward creatively and effectively. Non-fiction can instruct without losing the personal voice. For anyone who likes to write, this book is the first step to question your narrative self and begin to discover the wonderful implications that "self" can bring to your writing. I highly recommend this book.