On Meg Tilly, Early Trauma and the Rise of the Fragmented Memoir

In our Craft Section this month, Sonja Livingston explores the link between trauma and fragmented memoirs, and that unlikeliest of literary pioneers, Agnes of God * :

I have fallen for a thirty-year-old memoir.

That fact that a memoir snagged me isn’t surprising. For all the genre’s pitfalls—the dogged self-reference, unmitigated earnestness and occasional fibbery—when a story is both well-told and true, its power is unparalleled. A good memoir can magnify silenced voices, shed light on o...