Do you want to highlight social issues or inspire change? Personal storytelling is the way. South Africa is literally a breeding place for true stories, just waiting to be told. Let’s look at two powerful memoirs by South Africans, showcasing female and male grit and determination, in the face of shame and loss. Their domains and narratives are completely different – but the honesty with which they write, utterly compelling.
THE POWER OF STORY
How do I make what has happened to me relevant and worth reading?
“Language can be that kind of knife, the thing that cuts through to the truth,” says Salman Rushdie in an interview with New York Times. “I wanted to use the power of literature – not just in my writing, but in literature in general, to reply to this attack [an attack on his life in 2022 that maimed him].”
He was speaking about his latest book, Memoir of Love and Hate.
LOVE AND FURY: A MEMOIR, BY MARGIE ORFORD
“Women have always tacked between the demands of home – sex, food, babies, husbands, love – and the freedom (and the hostility) that being in the world and earning a living brings with it,” writes Margie Orford.
Orford is a feminist, journalist, academic and author. She writes in a painfully honest way about herself as a woman, in a way other women can relate to. Orford shows women’s shame and the disregard of so many female bodies, not only in an academic sense, but also from personal experience. Hers is a strong tale of fearlessness in an age where many people prefer to look away, suppress or endure.
Love and Fury, together with books such as Viola Davis’s Finding Me: A Memoir are excellent examples to study when you are contemplating writing your own memoir.
The importance of telling your story is highlighted by many comments in her book, one being the following:
“Ellen’s account… opened up a world I had been complicit in. A world I had no way of seeing until she told her story… She taught me that a woman publicly bearing witness to her own experience is a political act.”
RAEL LEVITT: IT TAKES A TSUNAMI
The book by Rael Levitt cuts to the truth in the way that Rushdie explains. Levitt was a self-made man by the age of nineteen.
“The book tells the story of how Levitt systematically built his company to become the largest and most respected Auctioneering House in South Africa. High-profiled auctions that were handled include work for Nelson Mandela, the King of Swaziland (now Eswatini), and an extremely long list of Death, Divorce, Debt & Downsizing cases.”
LEVITT AS A BRILLIANT ENTREPRENEUR
A large portion of the book explains the story of how Levitt has been accused of Ghost Bidding by Billionaire Wendy Appelbaum at the high-profile Quoin Rock Auction at the end of 2011, writes Christel Rosslee-Venter in her book review.
The media attacks almost destroyed Levitt but eventually, with therapy and a journey of running (eventually completing the New York Marathon), Levitt was able to get up and out of his depression.
“I believe that one’s life is a series of stories, so I decided that by the time I turned 50, a new career would be a happy ending to a dramatic chapter. So, I focused on building a new company based on how I wanted this book to end. It was a case of creating the story before writing about it,” Rael Levitt explains to Rosslee-Venter. She summarises Levitt’s life lessons and how to survive a crisis:
- Calm the fuck down – and if you can’t, pretend to.
- Focus on what’s important.
- Find emotional support.
- Don’t make any long-term decisions.
- Process your feelings.
- Be careful of saviours.
- Re-establish your routine.
- Detach from the noise.
- Take one day at a time.
- Have a good laugh.
- Exercise.
- Embrace where you are.
- Get good at being grateful.
- Learn and grow.
- Find your friends.
- Do good to feel good.
- Believe that life can be great again.
- Forgive yourself and others.
POWERFUL MEMOIRS BY SOUTH AFRICANS
There is healing, development and growth waiting in the wings when you write your memoir. The key is to lift the curtain away from your hidden, shamed, or elated memories, in all honesty.
“Your head is a living forest / full of songbirds” says e.e. cummings.
As an author coach I can help you to unlock those memories and transform them into words.
2 Responses
Everyone has a story. But, very few have the ability to solidify it in writing. In a way it is sad but it is what it is…
Good morning Johan. Yes, we all have a story to tell – and it is not that difficult to do it, once you put your mind to it –
I am always here, ready to assist anyone who wants to embark on this journey. Contact me if you would like to start writing!
All best wishes
Anemari