Why do people read, or write, unhappy autobiographies and memoirs? A simple answer to both questions is therapy, or more accurately, bibliotherapy. Bibliotherapy is a word that describes the act of reading selected works for the purpose of healing a personal issue, such as a history of child abuse.
Therapeutic Reading
The sharing of stories has long served as a medium for transmitting hard-learned lessons and wisdom from one person to another. Recipients of such stories share the storyteller's experiences while at the same time benefiting from the teller's retrospect, something people cannot do in the midst of their own experiences. In the best of cases, recipients of good storytelling can put the author's lessons to use and spare themselves from repeating destructive coping strategies. In other cases, readers may recognize errors in the author's behaviors, which they had not previously been able to recognize in their own behaviors.
HealingStory.org, a special interest group of The National Storytelling Network, promotes the use of storytelling as a tool for healing. The website includes stories for children in crisis, as well as book reviews and articles on a variety of relevant topics.
Therapeutic Writing
The writing and telling of an unhappy childhood story provides the author with a means to symbolically release the accumulated weight of painful past experiences. It can also serve as a way to reach out to others who have similar histories, giving the author a sense of purpose and the satisfaction of deriving something positive from something painful.
SilenceSpeaks.org, an international digital storytelling initiative, offers a supportive space for telling stories which might otherwise remain unspoken. The website includes stories and case studies, as well as links to related resources.
Memoirs and Autobiography Resources
Squidoo's Memoirs and Autobiography lens provides a variety of resources and links about memoir and autobiography writing and published works, including discussion groups, book clubs, related lenses, and writers' resources.
Helium's Memoirs and Biographies Zone presents autobiographical works of all kinds, as well as a variety of links to resources for memoir and biography writers and readers, including book clubs, discussion groups, and articles. Featured autobiographical essays, short stories, and poetry topics include childbirth, pregnancy, and parenting, family history, death and grief, and child abuse.
Both reading and writing personal histories involving child abuse can provide significant therapeutic benefits. Writers share stories, releasing emotional burdens, while readers share experiences, gaining life lessons and wisdom. In this way, writers and readers of memoirs and autobiographies both gain a healing sense of connection to others who have had similar experiences.
Sara McGrath - Sara is a veteran homeschool mom of three, Usborne consultant, and the author of Unschooling: A Lifestyle of Learning.
Join the Conversation