Elissa Altman on Permission
From the Memoir Nation Podcast, Hosted by Brooke Warner and Grant Faulkner
Memoir Nation: Weekly Inspiration for Writers is an extension of the Memoir Nation community hosted by Brooke Warner and Grant Faulkner, two friends and colleagues who bring a community-minded sensibility to the writing journey. Originally launched as Write-minded in 2018, this is a weekly writing podcast that focuses on memoir and personal writing, as well as industry trends and tips and resources for writers and authors.
All memoirists at some point in the writing process will grapple with what’s theirs to tell. This week’s show focuses on this all-important topic of permission. When do you need it? Who gives it to you and when and for what purpose? And do you need permission at all—from anyone but yourself? Centered around topics in guest Elissa Altman’s latest book, which is titled Permission, this is an empowering, deep-felt, and permission-giving episode—and something all writers, especially memoirists, can use to stay the course and keep going.
Subscribe and download the episode, wherever you get your podcasts.
________________________
Elissa Altman is the author of the Permission: The New Memoirist and the Courage to Create and the award-winning author of three memoirs: Motherland; Treyf; and Poor Man’s Feast. Altman’s work has appeared everywhere from Bitter Southerner and Orion to The Guardian, Narrative, O: The Oprah Magazine, Lion’s Roar, Krista Tippett’s On Being, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington. She has a popular Substack, Poor Man’s Feast, and she’s also a James Beard Award-winner for narrative food writing and was a finalist for the 2020 Lambda Literary Award in Memoir.
