Fundamentals of Interactive Journalism

Brooklyn Book Festival

It’s Brooklyn, baby.

The borough once famous for immigrants and food has become the final destination for writers. Colson Whitehead wrote in The New York Times if you google Brooklyn writers, and you will get “the future of literature as we know it.”

So it was only natural Brooklyn hosted the third annual Brooklyn Book Festival this past weekend, and brought out some of literature’s major stars. Some of the authors present included: Jonathan Lethem (“The Fortress of Solitude”), Nick Flynn (“Another Bullshit Night in Suck City”), Joan Didion (“The Year of Magical Thinking”), A.M. Homes (“The Mistress’ Daughter”), Chuck Klosterman (“Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs”), Pete Hamill (“North River”) and Richard Price (“Lush Life”).

The crowd outside Borough Hall

But despite all the big names, my favorite presentation was by the little-known Smith magazine, which collected a series of six-word memoirs in one of my favorite books, “Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six Word Memoirs by Famous and Obscure Writers.”

Rachel Fershleiser and Larry Smith

According to literary legend, Ernest Hemingway once said he could write a story in six words, and did: “For Sale: baby shoes, never worn.” Since then, aspiring writers have longed tried to capture the six-word story. Smith magazine asked readers and writers to submit their own.

Some of my favorites:

“I still make coffee for two.” – Zak Nelson
“I imagined more than office jobs.” – Gretchen Vitamvas
“I told you I was crazy.” – Michaline Babich
“Well, I thought it was funny.” – Stephen Colbert
“Same mistakes. Over and over again.” – Matthew Oransky
“I still secretly read wedding magazines.” – Lestlie Berryhill
“Maybe you had to be there.” – Roy Blount Jr.
“I will never be quite finished.” – J.P Hoban
“I tried. It was not enough.” – Robert McCarty
“Semicolons; I use them to excess.” – Iris Page
“I am trying, in every regard.” – Lionel Shriver
“I was a Michael Jackson impersonator” – Keith Knight
“Still lost on road less traveled.” – Joe Quesada
“Discovered moral code via Judy Blume.” – Beth Greivel
“People always pronounce my name incorrectly.” – Linnea Jimison
“Did I miss a deadline again?” – Bruce McGill

Anyway, I could go on and on. One of the best parts of “Not Quite What I Was Planning” is you can repeatedly pick it up and find new and interesting memoirs.

The editors of the book, Rachel Fershleiser and Larry Smith, gave a presentation Sunday where they said many of the memoirs are subjective. Some of the writers, they said, might not even recognize their own memoirs six months later.

So, for me, my six-word memoir for right now, less than two weeks before my 26th birthday, will be: “The devil was in the details.”

Anyone want to share his or her own six-word memoir?