Who am I? This is the title of a writing assignment I am given frequently. I often struggle to answer the question without defining myself through the means of another person. I am this person's wife, this person's mother, or this person's friend. I finally found a way to define who I am by searching through my writings, and I have found that I am much more complicated than I ever realized. I feel like more than one person wrote the story of my life, but it was only me. I am several personalities embodied in one being and I would never have realized this if I hadn't read my own thoughts and ideas repeatedly and in different contexts. Much of who we are is expressed in our writing, some of it unconsciously. There is definitely a place for the New Critics in the world, but I am more of a Reader Response type of person. Attempting to discover authorial intent (conscious or unconscious) can lead to complicated and definitive; yet, fascinating discovery of life within text.
"The words 'I am' are potent words; be careful what you hitch them to. The thing you're claiming has a way of reaching back and claiming you." ~A.L. Kitselman
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Interesting! When you say, "I feel like more than one person wrote the story of my life, but it was only me," I must point you back to your other ways of defining yourself (through others' lenses). Maybe it's "both/and" rather than "either/or" and that you are a kind of text that you yourself have authored *along with* others??
ReplyDeleteHi Elise,
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your insights. I really identified with you when you wrote, "Much of who we are is expressed in our writing, some of it unconsciously." I was just reading something that I wrote a couple of weeks ago, and honestly, as I read, I could not remember having written it or even having thought it. Has this ever happened to you?
Linda
Yes. I love looking through old journals of mine and having the uncanny experience of being completely removed from myself, asking: Who wrote this? Not me? I learn so much about myself this way.
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