Using memoir to generate memoir

Here is an idea that I received from poet and workshop facilitator Sandi Stromberg, who teaches wonderful classes at the Jung Center in Houston. She selects a memoir book to read and then writes prompts that come to her after reading the book, which she then shares with the women in the class. In the class I took, we read Writing a Woman's Life by Carolyn Heilbrun (Ballantine, 1988), and it was an extraordinary writing experience. Sandi would quote a passage or summarize the one of the points Heilbrun makes in her book, and then she would give us a prompt to get us writing. What a phenomenal journey.

I am reading Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott, and I plan to write prompts inspired by Lamott's words. Stay turned...