When the World Breaks Open
When The World Breaks Open: What in the Voice Creates Credibility or Reliability
Melody's response
"I have learned that there are emotional threads that are common across lives. Though the particulars and how they manifest are different, in the places where the truth of another experience well told, touches a familiar cord, our own knowing is awakened and validated." P. 229
Seema Reza's When the World Breaks Open is a passionate memoir told via snippets of her life via prose and poetry, taking a winding, yet still mainly chronological, course as it goes. Through the honest descriptions of her most heart-felt experiences, we arrive at deeper truths about life. Truths that I can feel deep in my core, even though I arrived at them via a slightly different route. I believe that is the power of well-written memoir.
"By sharing our individual truths and listening to the truths of others, we can clear the fog that separates what we have experienced from what we are supposed to have experienced." P. 230
And what about her voice leads me to believe that she is honest? That she is a credible or reliable source? I believe it is a combination of her willingness to share stories that do not paint her in a favorable light, her visceral explanations of the embodiment of grief, the unclear path of motherhood, her multifaceted explorations of the tensions that blossom when one doesn't fit in with the typical female narrative. She bares open all her vulnerabilities and imperfections, the ones we spend our days trying to cover up and hide.
Even when other characters' actions cause her pain, she doesn't really portray them as bad people. The point rests with her experience, her hurt. Not with them. For example, she focuses on the distance that develops after her mother tells her how her divorce will ruin her children, not on shaming her mother. I have flashbacks to how my father blamed my divorce entirely on my flaws and defects. Told me how I needed to try harder to make it work, when I had already died drying. Flashbacks to the feelings of yet-another-loss that subsequently inhabited my body. This craft technique builds credibility, as people are rarely so black and white as being good or bad. Furthermore, as we know that she cannot accurately portray their experience, as she is too close, it is best that she doesn't even try.
In the descriptions of her relationship with Karim, we feel the confusion that comes with loving someone who hurts you. She talks of their wild fights followed by wild sex (p.20, P 184). Nonetheless, the most difficulty I have with the accuracy of this book is her exposition of this very relationship. She doesn't come right out and call him what he is -- an abusive husband. We piece it together from her snippets, "He's not so bad...He never breaks a bone or blacks an eye" (p.13), and more definitively, the time when he grabs her friend's neck, and the incident where he pushed her off the bed, causing a pool of her blood to stain the carpet (21). Through their dialog in counseling, we see how mal-aligned their perspectives are. But then, she describes how she is also acting "crazy," (p.22), as if they are equals in their maltreatment of each other. I feel like this is a hard pill to swallow. I don't believe her. Although I do believe that she believes this, and in this way, she is still being honest. I just think that her perspective is inaccurate. Not The Truth, although it is her truth.
Melody's response
"I have learned that there are emotional threads that are common across lives. Though the particulars and how they manifest are different, in the places where the truth of another experience well told, touches a familiar cord, our own knowing is awakened and validated." P. 229
Seema Reza's When the World Breaks Open is a passionate memoir told via snippets of her life via prose and poetry, taking a winding, yet still mainly chronological, course as it goes. Through the honest descriptions of her most heart-felt experiences, we arrive at deeper truths about life. Truths that I can feel deep in my core, even though I arrived at them via a slightly different route. I believe that is the power of well-written memoir.
"By sharing our individual truths and listening to the truths of others, we can clear the fog that separates what we have experienced from what we are supposed to have experienced." P. 230
And what about her voice leads me to believe that she is honest? That she is a credible or reliable source? I believe it is a combination of her willingness to share stories that do not paint her in a favorable light, her visceral explanations of the embodiment of grief, the unclear path of motherhood, her multifaceted explorations of the tensions that blossom when one doesn't fit in with the typical female narrative. She bares open all her vulnerabilities and imperfections, the ones we spend our days trying to cover up and hide.
Even when other characters' actions cause her pain, she doesn't really portray them as bad people. The point rests with her experience, her hurt. Not with them. For example, she focuses on the distance that develops after her mother tells her how her divorce will ruin her children, not on shaming her mother. I have flashbacks to how my father blamed my divorce entirely on my flaws and defects. Told me how I needed to try harder to make it work, when I had already died drying. Flashbacks to the feelings of yet-another-loss that subsequently inhabited my body. This craft technique builds credibility, as people are rarely so black and white as being good or bad. Furthermore, as we know that she cannot accurately portray their experience, as she is too close, it is best that she doesn't even try.
In the descriptions of her relationship with Karim, we feel the confusion that comes with loving someone who hurts you. She talks of their wild fights followed by wild sex (p.20, P 184). Nonetheless, the most difficulty I have with the accuracy of this book is her exposition of this very relationship. She doesn't come right out and call him what he is -- an abusive husband. We piece it together from her snippets, "He's not so bad...He never breaks a bone or blacks an eye" (p.13), and more definitively, the time when he grabs her friend's neck, and the incident where he pushed her off the bed, causing a pool of her blood to stain the carpet (21). Through their dialog in counseling, we see how mal-aligned their perspectives are. But then, she describes how she is also acting "crazy," (p.22), as if they are equals in their maltreatment of each other. I feel like this is a hard pill to swallow. I don't believe her. Although I do believe that she believes this, and in this way, she is still being honest. I just think that her perspective is inaccurate. Not The Truth, although it is her truth.
Wow, Melody. This is such a powerful and thought provoking reaction to the memoir. I was especially captivated by your thesis here: "Through the honest descriptions of her most heart-felt experiences, we arrive at deeper truths about life. Truths that I can feel deep in my core, even though I arrived at them via a slightly different route. I believe that is the power of well-written memoir." Boom! I wish I had written that. In fact, I tried to write something like that in reaction to this memoir, but couldn't accurately get out my feelings about it. I find the end of your post especially interesting because I argued the opposite in some ways. I think Reza builds reliability as a narrator by showing different sides of Kalim instead of completely vilifying him. This statement on my part is not meant to deny or absolve him of his abuse in anyway. Still, to me, to only show one side of him would be too simplistic. If she had, I think we would understand even less why she wanted to stay with him as long as she did.
ReplyDeleteI do agree that she not only makes herself credible by not providing an angel/devil dichotomy but also invites us into the interiority of her experiences. Like this: She bares open all her vulnerabilities and imperfections, the ones we spend our days trying to cover up and hide.
ReplyDeleteyes,
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