Part of the THIS IS THE MOMENT series.
November 11th, 2019
Just a few days ago, I read an interview with a writer who described reading about and then experiencing what she described as hypergraphia—a clinical term which refers to the intense desire to write (or draw). The need to write one’s own story. She described the compulsion to write in the form of memoir as a very selfish act.
Of course I felt targeted by her opinion. I’ve been coming to THIS IS THE MOMENT for sixteen months, typing out essay after essay, entry after entry, and I’ve certainly been struck by the endless iteration of I, I, I, I…me, me, me, me…
And so, I do accept that I am in the grips of some sort of hypergraphia that may be needy, but isn’t pathological. I can’t accept that I might be doubly-diseased. Instead, I think that the first day after my diagnosis, when I sat down and wrote about what was happening to me, I was acting on a strong impulse to survive.
Still, as I sit down to write this, I have already filled THIS IS THE MOMENT with over 52 000 words. I’ve also been writing a regular book club blog for my favourite library, in addition to which Christian and I have been chipping away at a Harlequin romance (you read that right!) we decided to write together, and with the final chapter soon to be penned, we’ve passed the 57 000 word mark—which means we’ll have lots of editing to do.
I was doing the math the other night, lying in bed and thinking about hypergraphia, and with something like a hundred thousand words of prose drafted since the summer of 2018 (excluding Christian’s lovely words), I guess there is something compulsive about my writing.
I want to write in defense of hypergraphia. I’ve come to realise that for me (and many humans), writing is as essential as touching or speaking. It’s written thinking. It’s reaching out. It’s opening up—potentially to a crowd—by communicating to one person at a time. It can mean laying one’s self bare, privately and intimately on paper. It can also be like whispering into someone’s ear and them feeling as though you had only them in mind with your words. Writing can be the best means of sorting through what feels like chaos, pain, fear.
When the inner narrator—that voice inside your head that chatters incessantly—is paid some heed and an effort is made to capture, sort through, structure and transcribe its utterings, the result can often be salutary.
I began writing THIS IS THE MOMENT because I felt like otherwise, I would burst, or maybe implode, with the weight of what I’d learned. I did so too, because I wanted to stop shame in its tracks. I didn’t want to carry the mark of cancer alone beyond the protective wall that is my family. Writing about what was happening felt at the time, and still does, like opening up curtains to bright sunlight—letting in all of my loved ones, but strangers too.
* * *
I think that if you’re someone who writes a lot, then you’re most likely someone who reads a lot. The reverse is not nearly as probable, and that makes me feel lucky. A couple of days ago, someone close to me—to whom I’ve been sending books for years, hoping that they’ll provide him with hours of pleasure—wrote about one of these (Markus Zusak’s Bridge of Clay) on his Facebook page, even linking it with an online interview with the author. He loved reading it so much that he wanted to share his joy, plain and simple. He wanted others to have a shot at that same expansive emotion. Reading his post, my insides lit up like fireworks.
And so, hopefully, his words started a chain reaction, leading others to Zusak’s unique—and in this case beautiful—chain of words.
A person who writes will always have words to offer in lieu of their physical presence. Sometimes they’ll be arranged in a perfunctory manner, but more than likely they’ll be penned with an intention that’s a lot like the physical act of touching.
I think, I hope, that it’s the latter that fuels my hypergraphia.
REEF 