Laurie Lisle on Zoom with her new book Word for Word at Sharon's Hotchkiss Library in CT (see it on youtube soon!)

 Author Laurie Lisle was a journalist and then became a biographer. Portrait of an Artist, A Passionate Life, Four-Tenths of an Acre, Without Child, and a book about Westover School. Long ago through the library, she hosted a book group of women's memoires, including Stolen Lives and Diary of a Slave Girl which I recall taking part in and feeling moved by the books and discussions.

In a live interview, Laurie answered some questions such as the difference of a memoire and autobiography. A memoire is 'a slice of life which can go deep and personal' versus a telling the facts and basic story of one's life.

In her memoire, she explored writing about herself rather than doing a biography of another's life, shifting from first person in her own story from third person in a biography. One has a vast resource of memory when writing a memoire and that can be enriching but more challenging in ways in terms of 'dealing with memory.' She found it more challenging to do her own book, finding it 'more complex and risky.' She then read from the introduction and how she began her process of working with her memories.

She quotes Henry David Thoreau as describing memoire as... 'literary alchemy'. She shared the memory may be 'infused with imagination' and what is meaningful in the mind of the memoirist. She also had more than 40 handwritten journals and had more than 300K words in her computer from them to 'check her memories.' Her journals became more of reflection on the act of writing. 

She went to Providence and reviewed her roots and hometown movies, family legacies  and more. In NY she researched events she had been part of such as in the Civil Rights Movement. She shares stories about what really happened. Writing the book was like writing a letter to her younger self. She wanted to write 'with illumination' and allowed her to become 'a little wiser.' Much of that was done while she lived on the Green in Sharon. 

She wrote the book Word for Word for herself and wanted to make sense of her life on many levels. It's been called a time of 'deepened understanding.' She felt it was natural path and only recently thought of publishing it. She revised it as she went along and knew she would publish it but allowed the process to flow.

When asked about being a gardener as well as a writer, she described how one worked the body and the other the mind and yet complemented each other to weave the two into her day to find balance and relax the mind by acting 'in an instinctive way' with digging, planting and gardening. Then in turn the next day her morning  mindset would be ripe for writing. 

When writing about gardening  she realized that was a form of 'research' for her book and a way to connect with her mother who was in her late 80s and who gave her guidance. 

The story behind the her first Georgia O'Keefe biography intrigued the interviewer Gretchen Hachmeister. Laurie Lisle left her regular job to explore the Southwest and the artist's works. 

Laurie shared she loved getting to know artists and had special connections to some in her lives. She felt artists "lived with more intensity and had more fun than others. They were more independent and had more dedication to self-expression."

The difference between writing and painting is distinct although both work with images. She shared the gardening is more of an art form for her and a connection to writing. She offered that artists 'have more fun' and may stem from children making images and pictures before writing. She didn't think artists would take time from their studio where they enjoy making art to write a biography of their own or another artist.

Georgia O'Keefe did not give Laurie Lisle permission to write her biography and that she would not give it to art historians. Laurie felt she had the skills of a journalist to highlight how to forge, live and sustain a creative life. Laurie quoted experts to shed light on many aspects of O'Keefe's life. 

In her early thirties, Laurie was planning for her own life balance and path and was studying how O'Keefe crafted her life. From her, Laurie learned about courage, taking risks and being true to herself. By forty a lot of the insights took root.

The book Word by Word, is divided into three parts, Providence, Manhattan and Sharon. She shared about the landscapes meaning and influence. Laurie says 'we're very influenced by where we live...whether things feel safe, the quality of life, how the world looks and that we are formed by what's around us.' Laurie shared that she loves the landscapes, the woods. To have a 'spot of beauty behind her house' is meaningful. When she calls the first part of her book Providence, she was reclaiming a part of culture that does not exist anymore.

As a journalist there, she discovered more parts of the city and helped her gain insight into her roots and gain deep insight into the ethnic groups that are part of it.  In the 1960s and 70s, Manhattan was a place of uprising and conflict as well as with information from DC. Then living in Sharon CT was a safe enriching place with NYC near enough to do research.

Then there was a time for questions and responses and sharing. Laurie offered that sometimes reviewing her journals were jogging her memories a bit too much, once going to get support for becoming anxious about the memories. She doesn't mind working alone and fits her temperment. Living with an artist who is also working in solitude, they make time to have meals together to find a balance. 

Laurie had a trunk full of letters stored in the barn that she used to write the two biographies and did specific research back in the towns she lived in for her own book. The difference between writing about others and oneself was memory and used her journals to verify things to 'get things right and make sure the facts were right.' Even with her own interpretation she wanted to be 'as truthful as she could be.' It was complicated..

 Someone reading 'the fifth book of hers', said she felt secure in the author's rendering of the story. She was highly complimentary about the style and quality. 

Laurie said being part of the Civil Rights Movement was a powerful and illuminating time for her. Another person shared she was surprised that there was a need for women's empowerment and learned how many women were 'not getting as much as they should.'. 

Laurie worked at Newsweek right after the women had sued the magazine for not giving them better jobs. Gender Discrimination in employment became the law and took a long time for people to learn and address. A woman in the theatre shared that doing a lot of Shakespeare back in those times there were not many good roles for women. The female actor got angry with someone who cast all men in a Shakespearean play and let him know it.

When reading the journals, Laurie felt that was a 'reality test' to clarify her memory. Another person asked 'why did you trust your journals as being accurate." What you experience and what you select to remember is what is important to you (even if it's not what someone else remembered." Journals are one kind of memory  and looking back many years is another kind of memory, another writer shared. Laurie's sister read the first part of the memory differently but was essentially the same.  'The truth of the moment' is what Laurie was exploring. She shares that the memoire is not a legal document or held to strict standards, but in her effort to be truthful she wanted to verify things as much as possible.

Regarding being in the Sharon Garden Club she felt that was more of a social group more than anything else in terms of influencing or enriching her gardening experience. When someone asked if she can relate to the discipline of some who make themselves write 'ready or not.' She said she had a set routine as a writer and that 'it is a job' and takes a certain amount of will power.