unreliable memoirs
How odd. I’ve been reading this highly entertaining dialogue on the idiotic theory that someone other than Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare’s plays. I remembered fondly the day we went to Stratford and I put a flower on Shakespeare’s grave. Curst be he yt moves my bones! How I love a curmudgeon. I remembered walking along the Avon with Jeremy, looking at the ducks. I remember the sun shining on J’s yellow hair, him smiling at me with his eyes bright blue.
Except, cough, except that I was with Phil that day. The remotely comparable river I walked along with Jeremy was near Kilkenny Castle, more than two years later. I was in Stratford in midsummer – the daffodils were out. I was in Kilkenny on Jeremy’s 26th birthday, close to the winter solstice. There was no sun to shine on his yellow hair, just the dull gunmetal grey of Irish rain.
I guess it’s been so long since “we” meant “me and Jeremy” – eight years! – that I’ve forgotten it ever meant “me and someone else”. Still, it’s nice to be reminded why I write fiction. Memoir is hard! says Barbie. Let’s go shopping!
