It's really interesting that you picked up on the two opposing attitudes Jie and Moon take on telling their personal stories.
For me, I think there are two main reasons to the reluctance of sharing personal stories. The first one is as stated in the other comment and I paraphrase here: we have taken all the details of our lives for granted and have been so deeply ingrained in that cultural environment that we couldn't figure out what there is to share that might be new and valuable to others; whilst the other one might be a total lack of feeling self-important. Jie has found the reason and siginificance to his personal narrative, he thinks that there's meaning to it and he has the responsibility to tell, but most others in that era have been completely robbed of their individuality, they erase their personhood and deny the importance of their own stories. And that, I feel like might be somehow related to the overall sino-cultural scene, where most people lack a firm personality, especailly the women, as stereotypical as this may sound....
This was a great read. These lines really stuck with me:
"When I asked them with ardent interest what their youth was like, they often brushed it aside with “What’s there to talk about?” What appears to me an exciting first-hand historical account is to them a life so different from their grandchildren’s that they didn’t even know how to describe it in modern language."
I did that myself when I left Saudi Arabia, when everyone asked me what it was like to live there, and I genuinely didn't have a starting point to tell the stories, or know what would be valuable to share. When I wrote Driving by Starlight, a lot of the challenge was actually forcing myself to remember little details that felt completely mundane to me (e.g. that restaurants had signs forbidding women and dogs entry) but would be important to help others get a view into that world.
Thank you for sharing! The mundane details are so important. I met the author of “The Book of Secrets” at an event. An audience asked “how to encourage our grandparents to tell their stories”. She suggested that we should ask them about the details so that they feel grounded, then the narrative will flow.
It's really interesting that you picked up on the two opposing attitudes Jie and Moon take on telling their personal stories.
For me, I think there are two main reasons to the reluctance of sharing personal stories. The first one is as stated in the other comment and I paraphrase here: we have taken all the details of our lives for granted and have been so deeply ingrained in that cultural environment that we couldn't figure out what there is to share that might be new and valuable to others; whilst the other one might be a total lack of feeling self-important. Jie has found the reason and siginificance to his personal narrative, he thinks that there's meaning to it and he has the responsibility to tell, but most others in that era have been completely robbed of their individuality, they erase their personhood and deny the importance of their own stories. And that, I feel like might be somehow related to the overall sino-cultural scene, where most people lack a firm personality, especailly the women, as stereotypical as this may sound....
This was a great read. These lines really stuck with me:
"When I asked them with ardent interest what their youth was like, they often brushed it aside with “What’s there to talk about?” What appears to me an exciting first-hand historical account is to them a life so different from their grandchildren’s that they didn’t even know how to describe it in modern language."
I did that myself when I left Saudi Arabia, when everyone asked me what it was like to live there, and I genuinely didn't have a starting point to tell the stories, or know what would be valuable to share. When I wrote Driving by Starlight, a lot of the challenge was actually forcing myself to remember little details that felt completely mundane to me (e.g. that restaurants had signs forbidding women and dogs entry) but would be important to help others get a view into that world.
Thank you for sharing! The mundane details are so important. I met the author of “The Book of Secrets” at an event. An audience asked “how to encourage our grandparents to tell their stories”. She suggested that we should ask them about the details so that they feel grounded, then the narrative will flow.