Richard will be a panelist on the memoir panel. He has provided the following text of this exchange with a long-ago student of his; the questions and responses pertain to his first memoir, HALF THE HOUSE. Additionally, Richard was interviewed by Amy Grier about both HALF THE HOUSE and his later memoir, LOVE & FURY, for Solstice Literary Magazine.

Where did the impetus come from for you to write your memoir? What motivated you?

For me, it was, or at least it seemed to me to be, a do or die call to understand the roots of my own profound unhappiness. All I had ever wanted was to write, and now I knew what it was for: to help me re-member what had been dismembered by trauma and grief and miseducation and silence. I am not afraid of the word “therapeutic” and do not see it as a slur: telling stories has always been the way human beings make meaning. It took me 17 years to write HALF THE HOUSE, mainly because I wanted to turn painful experience into art, not just ink, but also because any first person account honestly told requires the piecing together of what shards you discover. It is an excavation and must be done delicately.

While you were writing, did you worry about others’ feelings?