Creative Nonfiction: The Autobiography
The form that is creative nonfiction can be confusing. It’s easy to differentiate by length – we know an essay is much shorter than a book. But what is the difference between an autobiography and a memoir? Or what’s the difference between an autobiography and biography?
What, exactly, is an autobiography?
The Autobiography
The terms for autobiography and memoir are often used interchangeably and with good reason. Read more
Creative Nonfiction: The Memoir
Creative nonfiction is a vast genre in the world of writing. It includes essays, autobiographies, and memoirs. Naturally, anything classified as creative nonfiction is based on facts – true events and personal accounts that are steeped in realism.
However, the writing in this genre is clearly creative in nature. Words are chosen with great care to give the writing resonance and presence. Language is stylistic rather than dry, and there is an effort to depict real events in colorful, compelling ways.
The memoir is one of the most popular forms in creative nonfiction. In recent years, memoirs have been dominant on bestseller lists and often occupy considerable space on shelves in bookstores. Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love
Introduction to the Memoir
Technically, the memoir is a type of autobiography. Today, the two terms are often used interchangeably and indeed both forms are usually written from the first person point of view. While a memoir is autobiographical, not all autobiographies can be classified as memoirs.
For starters, the structure of a memoir is unlike that of an autobiography. Most autobiographies cover the entire life span of the author whereas memoirs often focus on specific time periods or a particular experience. For example, Eat, Pray, Love examines one year in the life of the author – a year in which she is on a journey of self-discovery.
In his memoir Palimpsest
In modern times, the memoir may be written to preserve a family (or personal) history and can be used to offer an exposition of genealogy. Additional approaches to memoir include therapeutic and recreational writing.
Memoirs and Creative Nonfiction
A well-written memoir is often considered literary, meaning that the writing itself pays due diligence to craftsmanship in terms of word choice and language structure. In this sense, memoirs and creative nonfiction differ from other types of nonfiction in that they are a pleasure to read, not just for the content, but also for the presentation.
Dictionary.com gives one definition of literary as “characterized by an excessive or affected display of learning; stilted; pedantic.” It’s worthwhile to note that pedantic means “overly concerned with minute details or formalisms, esp. in teaching.”
Literary writing, then, is concerned with minute details – well-chosen words that flow smoothly, language that is as intriguing as the content or message that it conveys.
Writing a Memoir
Anyone can write a memoir. You might think your life story isn’t interesting enough that others would want to read about it, but surely in your life, you have had experiences worthy of sharing. Your memoir might be about an unusual trip you took that resulted in some kind of unexpected adventure, or it could simply recount a relationship that you experienced and that had a profound impact on you.
In a memoir, you tell your personal story – not necessarily your entire life story from birth to the present – but you share selected experiences, ones that readers will connect with, relate to, and find engaging.
Have you ever thought about writing a memoir? Do you write any other type of creative nonfiction? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment.
Creative Nonfiction and the Personal Essay
The difference between fiction and nonfiction is clear — fiction is made up and nonfiction is factual.
The line that separates nondescript nonfiction from creative nonfiction is a bit more blurry. In short, creative nonfiction harnesses the power of literary language as a means to captivate readers.
One of the most popular forms of creative nonfiction is the personal essay. In fact, personal essays are the basis of many popular blogs and often evolve into memoirs and other longer works.
How does the personal essay fit into the realm of creative nonfiction? What is it about a well-written personal essay that captivates readers? What topics are fair game for a personal essay? And why are personal essays an important part of published literature?
Creative Nonfiction
What separates creative nonfiction from other types of nonfiction (such as technical, scientific, or legal writing) is that it is designed for enjoyable readability.
Creative nonfiction borrows heavily from poetry and literary fiction, which feature language mastery. A writer must use clever turns of phrase, make intelligent and creative word choices, and build sentences, paragraphs – an entire piece – that does more than present the straight, nonfiction facts.
Successful works in this genre are highly engaging and entertaining to read.
The Personal Essay
The word “essay” comes from the French verb “essayer,” which means to try. Early essays were attempts at communicating thoughts or ideas about a particular subject. In time, the essay became a staple for writers and students.
The personal essay is a short, descriptive account of one’s ideas or experiences. As nonfiction, it is factual. And as creative nonfiction, the personal essay should be written to be engaging.
What makes personal essays so attractive is that they’re wide open. There are no rules to follow or structure to which we must adhere. You simply write your ideas, and since they’re yours, you can put all the focus on making the language interesting.
We might regard a blog as a series of personal essays, particularly when the blog is an account of someone’s personal experience. Some of the material that makes its way into journals and diaries are also personal essays.
The free form of the personal essay gives writers much berth to be creative. In some cases, a personal essay may grow into a memoir or autobiography.
Exploring Creative Nonfiction Through the Personal Essay
Because the personal essay is so easy to tackle and is void of rules, it’s one of the most accessible forms of writing, and probably the single best way for any writer to delve into creative nonfiction.
How do you write a personal essay? You just sit down and start writing. You can write about an event in your life. You can write about your goals and dreams. You can write about your past, the present, or your future.
As long as you keep on writing.
Have you experimented with the personal essay? Have you tried writing other types of creative nonfiction? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment.
Creative Nonfiction: Subgenres
We’ve already defined creative nonfiction as a genre, but what about all the sub-genres that it encompasses?
What about an article or an essay? What about a biographic piece of travel writing?
What about blogging?
Creative nonfiction is a wide category of writing, and although it’s a young genre, it already includes a host of sub-genres. By learning how to identify the difference between creative nonfiction and other types of nonfiction, we can start to build a list of those sub-genres.
The Line Between Creative Nonfiction and Other Nonfiction
There is something distinctly different between creative nonfiction and other types of nonfiction, though the line between them is not always easy to define.
Certainly, you would never confuse the creativity that goes into an article about food, one that actually makes your mouth water, and the history textbook you swallowed in junior high while holding your nose and squinting your eyes.
After scouring around the Internet for a bit, I found that Wikipedia had the best explanation:
Creative nonfiction …uses literary styles and techniques to create factually accurate narratives. Creative nonfiction contrasts with other nonfiction, such as technical writing or journalism, which is also rooted in accurate fact, but is not primarily written in service to its craft.
The main difference then, is that creative nonfiction puts greater emphasis on language and artistry. The purpose is not only to inform or educate, but also to entertain or intrigue.
Creative Nonfiction Sub-genres
Technically, any type of nonfiction could be considered creative nonfiction, depending how it is written. We tend to think of textbooks as nonfiction, but one that is written in a literary style would certainly earn the creative nonfiction label.
A blog may also qualify, depending on its content and the way it is written.
Yet there are some types of writing that almost always constitute as creative nonfiction:
- Memoir
- Food writing
- Travel writing
- Personal essays
- Literary journalism
- Biography and autobiography
Keeping in mind that creative nonfiction must be rooted in fact and should also be well-researched, can you think of any sub-genres to add to this list?
Do you write creative nonfiction? Which sub-genre is your favorite? Share your thoughts, ideas, and experiences in the comments.
What is Creative Nonfiction?
Creative writing includes more than just fiction and poetry. Creative nonfiction is a wide category of writing, which includes memoir and biography, food and travel writing, personal essays, literary journalism, and a host of other narrow writing categories.
Creative nonfiction is a relatively new field in writing, and only in recent years have works that are considered to be creative nonfiction started to receive the kind of attention from both critics and readers as fiction and traditional nonfiction.
It’s likely that creative nonfiction will continue to emerge as a dominant force in the world of writing. The world wide web continues to grow at an astounding rate, and much of the content on the Internet is considered creative nonfiction. Take blogs, for example. Many blogs would be considered creative nonfiction.
Creative Nonfiction Defined
How can you tell the difference between a literary novel and any other kind of novel?
Generally, what makes a work literary is the way it’s written. A literary novel is more than simple storytelling. Special attention is paid to language, word choice, rhythm, and voice. Creative nonfiction is factually accurate writing that lends credence to the craft of writing.
According to Wikipedia:
Creative nonfiction (also known as literary or narrative nonfiction) is a genre of writing truth which uses literary styles and techniques to create factually accurate narratives. Creative nonfiction contrasts with other nonfiction, such as technical writing or journalism, which is also rooted in accurate fact, but is not primarily written in service to its craft.
Unlike fiction and poetry, the creative nonfiction genre calls into question research, fact, and credibility. While these facts might be examined by the writer and opinions can be interjected, the material must be verifiable and accurately researched and reported.
Due to the factual nature of creative nonfiction, ethics may come into play. In recent years, some memoir authors have been heavily criticized for straying from the truth. There may be some wiggle room here, however. Since a memoir is not considered journalism, a writer may decide to take creative liberties with the facts, however, this may cause an uproar among critics and may even lead to a controversial reception of the work.
Creative nonfiction continues to grow and become more widely accepted and recognized as a valid form of both literature and nonfiction.
Have you written creative nonfiction? How strictly do you feel a memoir or other work of creative nonfiction should stick to the facts? Do you feel that nonfiction works should focus on content and not creativity? Share your thoughts in the comments.
