Memoir ASSIGNMENT
For this assignment, you’ll need to write an essay based on a significant memory from your past that had an effect on your life and/or your thinking.
English 1010 Essay 4
Memoir ASSIGNMENT SHEET
For this assignment, you’ll need to write an essay based on a significant memory from your past that had
an effect on your life and/or your thinking.
The event might be a ‘big’ one (an event that drew an audience, an event with a budget) or small one
(the two A.M. conversation with your cousin that changed your life), but whatever it is, you need to
make it clear to your reader why it was important to you and (this is a bit more challenging) why it is
important for them to read about.
Don’t be misled by this last part—you’re not trying to ‘sell’ a moral lesson at the end of your essay here.
But you DO need to think about how this memory will connect with readers who aren’t you. How does
your experience connect with the universal human experience? How will you show that link to your
readers through your work?
You need to introduce a reader to a significant experience/memory from your life. You need to
immerse the reader in the detail necessary to re-live the experience with you, and you need to help
the reader understand how this experience relates to them (the reader).
The key challenge of this assignment will be to present the memory in a way that is effective and
engaging for the reader. Remember that while trauma, births, and weddings are significant to the
people involved, most people have heard stories like this several times. You’re not simply trying to gain
approval or sympathy from your reader—you’re trying to help them connect to the experience you’re
writing about.
SPECIFICS: 5+ pages. MLA format.
SUPPORT: Chapter 18 of The Norton Field Guide (p. 216)
