Put it in Writing: Guide for Populore Narratives - Softcover

St. Louis, Melinda J

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0965269906 ISBN 13: 9780965269902

Publisher: Populore Pub. Co, 1996

Synopsis

This inviting "how-to" book explains the process of writing a personal narrative-from deciding what to write and getting started to choosing interesting details, including photos.

About this title

From the Back Cover

Memories are precious. Most of us can confess to having boxes full of photographs, letters, and other memorabilia crammed under our beds, in our closets, or in the attic. Perhaps, in the case of the truly industrious, the photographs from the high school prom and family vacation, tickets to a first baseball game, and the lock of hair from baby's first haircut are arranged in albums and scrapbooks. Each photo and treasured item, as they say, is worth a thousand words. We'd love to have the photo or keepsake and the story behind it preserved forever, but writing that story can often be intimidating.

A good story does not necessarily come from a good writer; it comes from an experience. But getting that story down raises lots of questions, especially for those not used to writing: where to begin, how to choose a story, how to organize it, what to do with it after it's written, and how to remain motivated and on track during the process. It is for these people that this guide has been written.

The Put It in Writing Guide for Populore Narratives is designed to help people answer these and many other questions about the writing process, thereby making story preservation enjoyable and easy. This guide takes the user through the steps to create an original Populore narrative, from choosing a topic to editing and proofing the finished product.

A Populore narrative is typically short, anywhere from a paragraph to several pages long, and may include a photo. It can be:

A tribute to a loved one, living or not, that reveals how he or she is special

A short piece of writing that celebrates an important event in your life or part of your own unique history

A personal anecdote of a true event, meant to preserve memories before they are lost forever

A way to preserve the meaning of a treasured place or thing

A representative story that gives the reader information about the writer or subject

To facilitate the writing process, this book includes numerous resources: nearly 150 sample narratives, several pages of interview questions and worksheets, numerous organizational suggestions, and simple fill-in-the-blank story forms. The Put It in Writing Guide for Populore Narratives pulls all these elements together to help you preserve your stories in a written form that will be treasured for generations.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Preface

Dear Reader:

Stop and think for a moment. Is there a person, place, or object you would like to be remembered for years to come? Or maybe you have an experience, an event, or a triumph that you don't want to be forgotten. It could be an amusing account of an adventure or mishap. It might involve you, a loved one, a special friend, a descendant, or an ancestor. The history books are filled with stories of great leaders, revolutions, natural disasters, and so on. But what about your story and stories of those like you? Most people think at some time or another that they wish that they knew more about their great grandparents or that they would like their grandchildren to understand what their life was like "way back when."

Populore Publishing Company would like to introduce you to perhaps a new idea. We believe that everyone has a story to contribute to history, and we are dedicated to helping people like you preserve these stories. Populore (pronounced "pop-you-lore") is a coined word referred to "stories of the people." These stories are often passed from person to person through oral history, holiday dinners, family reunions, and letters. They do not make it into the history books, and so often, over time, they are lost forever. There is no reason for your story to become lost to future generations. We would like to help you "put your story in writing" and then provide a means for you to have your story published in an attractive hard-bound book destined to become a family heirloom. We will also safeguard these "people stories" for future generations, so that they can know what you were like and what was important to you.

Since you have picked up this Put It in Writing Guide for Populore Narratives, we hope that you are curious about what it means to "put it in writing," or that you have already decided to take the first step to do just that. This guide book is intended to help you select a story from your own experience, to convince you that "putting it in writing" is not as hard as it may seem, and to walk you through the creation of your own story (which we call a Populore narrative). Written, a Populore narrative can be a paragraph to several pages long--it's up to you. Even if you haven't written anything in years or don't think that you're good at it . . . even if you aren't sure if anything in your life is worth preserving, the following sections will help you discover that (1) you do have a story worthy of publishing and preserving and (2) with this guide's help, you can easily choose, create, and write a narrative that you will be proud of.

Enjoy as you discover how you can become your own historian!

Introduction

You and what happens to you are an important part of history. It's possible that you have never thought about how wonderful it would be to be able to preserve representative parts of your life for your children's children or for other interested people. However, your descendants, curious about their heritage, will want to know the stories of your life. Even people you don't know will search for information about the way life was . . . the life of ordinary people, not only the lives of political figures and movie stars. Though they may not be famous, the people you love contribute to history as well.

For this and for many other reasons, it's important to record your stories. Published memories can make history come alive and help others know who you are and where you come from. Stories can help your offspring know more about who they are and where they come from. Writing your stories can give you a fresh perspective and allows a little bit of you to live forever in the heart and history of the land. It's your gift to yourself, to your loved ones, and to future generations. Possibly the most important reason for putting it in writing is the satisfaction and sense of achievement you receive from holding a book with your story written by you. You can do it, with relative ease, and this guide is here to help you.

So, let's get down to business. You decide that you are going to write your story so that you can pass a part of yourself on to future generations, you get a pen and paper or sit at the typewriter or computer, you are all set and then all of a sudden you realize that you have no idea where to begin. There are so many people to whom you would like to pay tribute, so many memories of your life events floating through your head, so many funny stories about the kids, so many touching moments with your spouse, so many special places where you have spent time. And then you might also worry, thinking that your writing skills won't do your story justice or that you really don't have enough time to put into such a large project anyway.

Here's where this Put It in Writing Guide for Populore Narratives can help you. In this book, you will find some of the story categories which encompass an enormous variety of topics. Under each category, we have suggestions and then some easy-to-follow tips which will make your thought and writing processes quite smooth and easy. We also include fictitious sample narratives, with explanations of how each was organized, in each category, along with over 120 more samples for you to look through for inspiration and enjoyment. You are welcome to use any of the sample narratives in this book as models for your own story. For the person who is even more hesitant, we have special appendices with careful step-by-step instructions about everything from interviewing family members to basic writing tips.

A Guide to the Guide: How to Use This Book

Most everyone will approach their writing at different stages with different styles of planning and different expectations. before you embark on your journey through this Put It in Writing Guide for Populore Narratives, you might want to read this short "how to use this guide" section and answer a few questions for yourself. Depending on what you are looking for, this section will suggest other chapters and sections in the guide that might be especially helpful to you. If you do this, you will most likely be able to use the guide efficiently to satisfy your particular needs.

There are two major ways to use this guide: to "warm yourself up" to the idea of preserving people's stories or, if you have something already in mind, to systematically guide and help yourself through the process as necessary. If you are a person who is simply curious without any clear ideas, you may just want to begin reading the guide from the beginning until you find something that especially sparks your interest. Or, if you do not want to spend that much time, the book is written in such a way that you can pick a chapter or section at random and see if it gives you any ideas about what you would like to preserve.

You may be the type of person who really feels or who often has thought that the stories of ordinary people should be preserved. Even if you aren't, and you are fairly decided that you want to write something, then you may want to consider the following general questions and thoughts in order to find the sections that would be most appropriate for what you want. In this guide, we have categorized narratives into the following types (with a chapter on each): Tributes, Life Events, Personal Anecdotes and Stories, Places, Treasures, and Miscellaneous. This is, of course, not a definitive list because everyone will have a slightly different approach. We hope that these questions will get you thinking about the types of things you might like to write about. If you have something completely different in mind, we encourage you to create your own scheme for putting it in writing. Bear in mind that there is much overlap among narratives types, so your story may fit more than one chapter.

Edition details

• Publisher: Populore Pub. Co
• Publication date: 1996
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0965269906
• ISBN 13: 9780965269902
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 220