Word: gornick
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...does the writer of personal narrative pull from his or her own boring, agitated self the truth speaker who will tell the story that needs to be told?” This is the fundamental question that essayist and critic Vivian Gornick sets out to answer in her new book The Situation and the Story: The Art of Personal Narrative. Inspired by 15 years of teaching personal nonfiction writing in Master of Fine Arts (MFA) programs, Gornick skillfully combines her own insight and experience from 30 years as a writer with models of nonfiction writing from some of the best...
...Gornick begins with the story of a funeral she attended in which one eulogist stood out from the rest: She was able to bring the deceased to vivid life while others had evoked only passing sentiments. Gornick wondered why this particular speaker, who held no special knowledge of the deceased, had been so much more effective than the other speakers. The next morning she awoke and realized the difference: The eulogy had been composed...
...when they give one of those reassuring Chuck Yeager speeches saying that there's nothing to worry about even though the plane has no landing wheels. Females are assigned the social role of grinning all the time, Ralph. It's one way men keep women in their place. Vivian Gornick talks about "that damned dazzling smile," and Social Psychologist Nancy Henley calls it "woman's badge of appeasement" that placates the more powerful male. Henley did some experiments showing that women smile 89% of the time in social encounters, while men smile only 67%. And 26% more of female...
...GORNICK IS BY NO MEANS a stupid woman and one regrets that she is so dogmatically silly. Nonetheless, she does remain free of the stereotypes that have ensnared past analysts. She does not, for example, attempt to prove that all Communists are busily repenting the error of their ways, nor does she argue that all Communists are busily repenting the error of their ways, not does she argue that all Communists are misunderstood saints. In fact, she successfully shows that Communists came from--and return to--all types of intellectual, cultural and economic strata...
...Gornick's own politics are clearly to the left of center. She wants to believe that men and women will continue to struggle to overcome the "warring elements of the race to humanize itself." She turns to passion and hope as a means to this end. The Romance of American Communism lacks coherence, though, because of its purgative function for the author. Gornick cannot overcome the contradictions inherent in her dual role as an intellectual critic and a sentimental admirer. For despite her ideological opposition to American Communism as she has known it, she remains an emotional fellow traveler...