Reflections on Creative Nonfiction, Memoir, (Auto)Biography, Life-Writing, and the Essay
23 Apr 2010 at 07:13
Julija Šukys
Anthropology, Journeys, Life-blood, Piers Vitebsky, Russia, Siberia
Piers Vitebsky, The Reindeer People: Living with Animals and Spirits in Siberia. Houghton Mifflin, [2005] 2006. When I told my aunt that I wanted to go to Siberia to find the village where my grandmother (her mother) was exiled for seventeen years, her immediate reaction was: “you can’t do that! you can’t go there!” Since [...]
31 Mar 2010 at 08:59
Julija Šukys
Alternate Economies, Anthropology, Domesticity, Eastern Europe, Friendship, Gardening, Journeys, Margaret Paxson, Research, Russia, Siberia, Slavs, Villages, Writing
I’ve been reading my friend Margaret Paxson’s book, Solovyovo: The Story of Memory in a Russian Village. Paxson, an anthropologist, watched, interviewed and listened to the villagers of Solovyovo for many months to learn how they related to each other, to their land and to the past. Yesterday, shortly before going to a dinner party [...]
10 Mar 2010 at 08:53
Julija Šukys
Algeria, Anne Carson, Anthropology, Archives, Assia Djebar, Biography, Creative Nonfiction, Exile, Journeys, Ona Šimaitė, Ona Šukienė, Paris, Research, Russia, Siberia, Virginia Woolf, Writer's block
A writer friend of mine asked me recently how I keep going when things aren’t going well, and what I do when I become blocked. The most useful thing I do when I feel empty is read. I turn to authors whose work I want to emulate: Virginia Woolf, Anne Carson, Assia Djebar, Joan Didion, [...]
