Speak, Memory

While Nabokov was not a memoirist, like all writers he used memory to express his conscious thoughts. All our ideas and thoughts, even our feelings, begin in memory. As we age, our memories build upon each other the way cities build upon the remains or ruins of ancient civilization.



Why not? If the site was once favorable, by a river, say, or on a hilltop safe from enemy attack, the site is still useful. Digging the foundation of a new building, one might find tools abandoned by previous inhabitants.



Our memories are like middens, those ancient trash heaps archeologists love, full of artifacts that recall long-forgotten stories. When we write memoir, we are the archeologists of our own midden.



You can call it a scrapbook or journal, it's all about the Past in the Present. And it's always a changing process.