All (auto)biographies and memoirs have one thing in common: they are usually written in the retrospective way, meaning that even if they “read chronologically forward, they are composed essentially backward.” (Louis Menand in Smith and Watson) In life writing the term “memoir” is complex to define, since it has different definitions, depending on various contexts. The term memoir derives from the French word for “memory”, which implies that it could be written in a subjective and impressionistic rather than a factual and strongly evident way. A memoir can neither be fiction, nor a novel, since the memoir genre tries to depict the ultimate truth and the real life of the author, the first-person-narrator or other individuals. Nonetheless nowadays memoirs can also include invented or enhanced materials or novelistic techniques as embellishments, because they are a form of literary art. (Couser)
It is often hard to distinguish between memoirs (or factual writing) and fiction, because many works are paradoxically hybrid forms of both of the literary types and additionally fiction often pretends to be factual and to depict the real world. Furthermore the term memoir is often used as a synonym of autobiography, even though it is only a subgenre of autobiography, because the memoir must not be about the author him- or herself: “whereas biography can be about anyone who has ever existed, memoir can only concern someone known to, and remembered by, the author. […] It will be, or resemble, reminiscence, consisting of personal recollection.” (Couser) Memoirs in direct comparison to autobiographies generally tend to be more concise, selective and focused. According to G. Thomas Couser what differentiates life writing from the real life is that “life is long […] multidimensional and complex, sometimes chaotic; and life writing must have form and focus. Life inevitably far exceeds the capacity of writing to contain it.”
Even though the memoir genre, and especially its flourishing in the United States of America and Great Britain, is a patriarchy product it strengthened feminism and allowed women to “speak publicly” (in form of a written and published book, a typical memoir). Often the memoirs of female writers report about traumatic periods in their life, such as abuse or violence.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
1.1 The Memoir and its Boom
1.2 Comparing Movies & Books
2. Main Body
2.1 Susanna Kaysen’s Girl, Interrupted
2.2 Augusten Burroughs’ Running with Scissors
3. Conclusion
3.1 Conclusion and Outlook
4. Appendix
4.1 Works Cited
Objectives and Themes
This paper examines the rise of the memoir genre in the United States and analyzes the narrative and thematic shifts that occur when these personal accounts are adapted into feature films, using two prominent examples to illustrate these discrepancies.
- The historical context and characteristics of the "Memoir Boom."
- Analysis of Susanna Kaysen’s Girl, Interrupted and its cinematic adaptation.
- Analysis of Augusten Burroughs’ Running with Scissors and its cinematic adaptation.
- The impact of narrative compression and artistic choices in film adaptations of factual memoirs.
- The relationship between public interest in trauma/mental health and the success of "Misery Memoirs."
Excerpt from the Book
2.1 Susanna Kaysen's Girl, Interrupted
In the beginning of her most successful book, Girl Interrupted, the author is introduced shortly to the readership: Susanna Kaysen was born in 1948 and lives today in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She wrote three novels and two memoirs; one of them being Girl, Interrupted. The memoir was first published in 1993, almost thirty years after the described events took place. Ultimately, one of the most traumatic passages in her life is written in the retrospective view. It recollects Susanna Kaysen's memories about her almost two year stay at the psychiatric hospital McLean (which is located in Belmont, Massachusetts), when she was just a eighteen-year-old girl. Kaysen managed to obtain her 350 page file from the hospital with the help of a lawyer. The book was named after the Johannes Vermeer's (Dutch artist) painting Girl Interrupted at Her Music, which today hangs in an art museum, the Frick Collection in New York City.
In the book several of Susanna's original medical records are presented, in form of printed copies out of her 350-paged medical file from McLean, serving as a kind of evidence for the readership. The first of those presented records diagnoses Susanna Kaysen, who was the teenage patient that time, with several grave mental symptoms and diseases, such as “psycho-neurotic depressive reaction, personality pattern disturbance (mixed type), and undifferentiated schizophrenia” and finally the “Borderline Personality” as end diagnosis (Kaysen, 4). The first mental health record appears already in the beginning, after the acknowledgments and already before the text of the story even starts. She then starts the book with the question most people asked in her closer environment: what happened to her and how could it come so far, that she was sent to a mental health institution. Kaysen concludes from this human curiosity, that many people in her closer sphere might be afraid that something similar might happen to themselves and that they just want to assure that it will not.
Summary of Chapters
1. Introduction: This chapter defines the memoir genre, explores its flourishing in the 1990s as the "Memoir Boom," and introduces the methodology of comparing literary memoirs with their movie adaptations.
2. Main Body: This section provides a detailed comparative analysis of Susanna Kaysen's Girl, Interrupted and Augusten Burroughs' Running with Scissors, examining how specific scenes and character portrayals differ between the original texts and their film versions.
3. Conclusion: This chapter synthesizes the findings regarding the differences between the books and films, noting that changes in adaptations are often driven by social shifts, the need for dramatic focus, and the challenges of representing complex mental health experiences on screen.
4. Appendix: This section contains the complete list of primary and secondary sources cited throughout the paper.
Keywords
Memoir, Memoir Boom, Girl Interrupted, Running with Scissors, Susanna Kaysen, Augusten Burroughs, Adaptation, Film, Mental Health, Trauma, Misery Memoirs, Autobiography, Narrative, Life Writing, Media Analysis
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the primary focus of this academic paper?
The paper focuses on the genre of the American memoir, specifically analyzing the "Memoir Boom" and how the translation from book to film affects the portrayal of the author's real-life experiences.
What are the central themes discussed in this work?
Central themes include the definition of memoirs, the representation of mental illness and trauma in literature, the sociological impact of the memoir market, and the technical differences between written autobiography and cinematic storytelling.
What is the main research question of this study?
The research asks how successful American memoirs are adapted into movies, what discrepancies emerge during this process, and why these shifts are made by film producers.
Which scientific methods are employed?
The paper utilizes a comparative literary and media analysis approach, contrasting original text excerpts with specific scenes from film adaptations to identify patterns of change.
What content is covered in the main body?
The main body provides case studies of two specific memoirs: Susanna Kaysen’s Girl, Interrupted and Augusten Burroughs’ Running with Scissors, detailing their publication history, content, and the subsequent cinematic adaptations.
Which keywords best describe the paper?
Key terms include Memoir, Memoir Boom, Adaptation, Mental Health, Susanna Kaysen, Augusten Burroughs, and Life Writing.
How does the movie adaptation of "Girl, Interrupted" differ from the book?
The analysis notes that the film changes character traits, such as the appearance of the nurse Valerie, and reorders scenes—like the "missing bones" episode—to emphasize the protagonist's mental state more effectively for a film audience.
Why did Augusten Burroughs change his name and alter details in his work?
The paper suggests that Burroughs changed his name to distance himself from his past and his dysfunctional family, and altered details to protect the privacy of the real people involved while maintaining the narrative integrity of his memoir.
- Citar trabajo
- Rashida Thielhorn (Autor), 2019, The Memoir Boom in the United States, Múnich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/507962
