A serious life, by ...

A serious life, by definition, is a life one reflects on, a life one tries to make sense of and bear witness to. Truth in a memoir is achieved not through a recital of actual events; it is achieved when the reader comes to believe that the writer is working hard to engage with the experience at hand. What happened to the writer is not what matters; what matters is the large sense that the writer is able to make of what happened.
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 Vivian Gornick

Quotes from the same author

self-possession is the ability to face without fear life in all its contradictions.
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 Vivian Gornick
We all grew up so utterly vulnerable, enthralled by romantic love as we knew it. First of all, it was pounded into you every which way that you've got to get married and you've got to have babies. That you're not a natural woman if you don't. So that led to a lot of sitting by the telephone and waiting for a call. And that led you into a culture in which you were always in a subordinate position without realizing it; hamstrung, not able to take action. That was the most important thing: you were always waiting to be desired.
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 Vivian Gornick
What happened to the writer is not what matters; what matters is the large sense that the writer is able to make of what happened.
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 Vivian Gornick
That's the hardest thing to do-to stay with a sentence until it has said what it should say, and then to know when that has been accomplished.
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 Vivian Gornick
Research is the live heart of the scientific life ... Greatness of position, respect for past accomplishments, the Nobel Prize itself -- none of these can compensate for the loss of vitality only research provides.
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 Vivian Gornick