Clearing Up The Blurred Fiction Lines

In Truth in Memoir Caroline van de Pol is concerned about  the missing piece in her memoir. According to her, this missing piece was herself. However, what holds her back is her concerns over a lack of authenticity. She believes that the her now could not write about the her in the past. Her main points to counteract this issue is to use narrative strategies, and to sort of blur the line between fact and fiction - do some "life writing" and make real people into characters in your story.

I agree that it an issue that deserves attention when writing a memoir. Though I believe it's one that can be resolved fairly easily. Using narrative strategies is useful, however I think turning real people into characters is a little problematic.

I find that you are able to still tell the truth using narrative strategies. Minor details can be left out, and the past is able to be told a little more factually. Writing about your past self is possible if you use reflection. You can anecdotally say things like "boy was I stupid," or "at the time I thought..."

If you were to turn people in your life into characters for the sake of narrative use, then I think you open up the door to be untruthful. You allow yourself to think "this is what I think this character (person) would do" and write from that instead of what actually happened.