I’m knee deep in Naked by David Sedaris and it’s possibly one of the most entertaining books I’ve ever read. It shocks me that anyone could have a life like he has had, but it shocks me more that anyone can write about their life as well as he does. One of the things about memoir and essay writing is there’s a big question of “Who bloody cares?” which is a valid question when it comes to spending any amount of time reading about other people’s lives. Are we really so interesting that anyone would be fanscinated to spend 200 pages with us? I doubt it, yet we’re just narcissitic enough to do it anyway. David Sedaris, on the other hand, is plenty interesting, almost to the point that it seems necessary to read about his life. We should all be so lucky to learn what he has.

I think part of it really is that he’s entertaining as hell. His chapter about the prositute that spends an evening just before Christmas with his family is so funny that I had to leave my desk at work to compose myself.

This book humbles me because I know I do not write like this and I believe that memoir is not widely read because it’s so god damned boring in most cases but if we could tell the story of our lives like David, we’d hook a nation. How many of us dread looking at other people’s pictures? Or hearing stories about other people’s vacations? Or even worse, hearing about other people’s dreams? It’s mindnumbing. It really is. And so are most memoirs. I’m sorry, I realize I’m a creative non-fiction writer, but most of it is boring. The number of writers that write their lives well is pretty small. I want to be a part of that group someday, but I don’t blind myself to think that I’m there yet.

So go read some Sedaris. Laugh hysterically, feel happy that it didn’t happen to you, wish that it had happened to you, enjoy some good writing.