Friday, March 28, 2008

"So, What Exactly Are They Smoking in Eugene, Oregon?"

The literary world's got their fingers pointing to a small town on the West Coast. Knowing that dear town as I do, I can't say that I'm surprised to learn that it turned out a contributor to the great memoir-faking hullabaloo. They do lots of funny and plenty of stupid things there. Being attached to that dear town as I am, I'm immediately inclined to defend its produce and write the whole thing off as a silly hippie prank. But upon serious thought, I just really think there's no excuse for this. Write it, fine, but please call it a novel, not a memoir.

4 comments:

IndianaJones said...

unfortunately I've seen a lot of what they are smoking in Eugene and think that may be a heavy contributor to said 'memoir' hoaxing. It is unfortunate and rather sad but seeing as Eugene may be the Pot capital of the world, really what do we expect?

Valerie said...

Wow. This is ridiculous. Especially the memoir writing teacher who doesn't know what to call it. The whole point of it being called a memoir is to indicate to the audience that it is the true story of what happened to a real person.

deanna said...

On the brighter side, I spoke to several die-hard (or tie-dyed) Eugenians who denounce what this woman did as vehemently as people from places where they don't inhale, and the hippie folk were just as outraged. Telling the truth still seems to count.

Cherie said...

Thanks for being so forgiving of our little town - it is a wonderful, if hippie-prank, place to live and grow.