Wild about Wild and Close Reading

Richard Gilbert presents an exceedingly intelligent and detailed discussion of how reading a particular book closely, in this case Cheryl Strayed’s acclaimed Wild, can help writers work through structural problems in their own books-in-progress.  Gilbert is always excellent on craft, but may have outdone himself here, in the best way. Here is an excerpt, but take the time to read his entire post over at Bill and Dave’s Cocktail Hour:

In June I threw out the first act of my memoir—it was too slow to start—which helped me cut forty pages, and I broke up two chapters on my father and threaded him throughout. That project took the entire month. I felt I was seeing my material with a colder eye, and placing it or cutting it for effect, not using it because I loved it or because I hoped it was working.

At the start of July I printed out hard copy of my manuscript and also began rereading Cheryl Strayed’s Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail. My morning practice was first to read some of Wild, my morning book, and then to read and edit my memoir printout. Over the years I’ve picked up the notion of reading and rereading three, and only three, books as models while writing. But I don’t strictly follow that regimen, in part because I’ve worked on my memoir for so long that I’d go insane with just three books; however, I do try to operate in that spirit of that concentrated devotion to a few books that I aspire to emulate. As a memoir, Wild truly cooks, that much was clear from my first reading, and in the way I needed my book to cook.

…  As I write this, I’m halfway through the memoir again. But the day I read Chapter Five looms in my mind like a bad day on the PCT, like a landslide. I felt a doom-laden insight creep upon me as I read the chapter, so recently reworked on my computer, a leaden despair and a roaring in my ears. Chapter Five was a mess. The through story had collapsed, and the chapter’s various sections seemed like just a bunch of this ‘n that—useless rubble, even though as individual pieces they read fine. I might have felt the earth fall away on my own, but the contrast between my effort and Wild’snarrative probably was what gobsmacked me.

And yet, despite the fact that seeing such a problem was a gift, I melted down for a day or two. Fear and confusion riddled me. Could I dig out of this one? How?