The Book That Made Me Write

I bought this book with a heap of others, as holiday reading I was hoping would help me figure out what to do next, having just hung up my ballet shoes (and my identity as 'one of the dancers') for good. A book about nutritional science, Mindy Kaling's memoirs, a book on applied economics, and a book about finding happiness in architecture. I've already reviewed the architecture book here, but all of these books were read cover to cover, enjoyed with an ice cold Kas Limon and the sound of my siblings smacking each other with pool toys. But The Opposite of Loneliness made my stomach hurt with nostalgia by the end of the first page, and is the reason I stopped writing privately, and started writing things I intended to be read by others.

A collection of essays and stories written by Yale graduate Marina Keegan, The Opposite of Loneliness was compiled after the viral success of her last essay for the Yale Daily News, which has the same name as the book. Keegan was a top student, graduating magna cum laude from Yale, had successfully written a play to be produced at the New York International Fringe Festival, and had a job waiting for her at the New Yorker. This book was published just after she graduated, before she took the job at the New Yorker, when she died in a car crash after her boyfriend fell asleep at the wheel.

This book reads like a galaxy of hope and possibility that is punctuated by the tragedy of what happened to its author. Her writing has a level of craftsmanship I can hardly believe a twenty-two year old had, as well as an insanely intricate awareness of emotion laced through the pages. Of course we mourn what Keegan could have been, but what's really astonishing is what she had already done. What's written on these pages is some of the most unforgettable, yet accessible writing I have ever read. Her writing is wise but her voice remains raw, innocent, optimistic. I read this book and thought 'I want to write like this' and for the first time believed that perhaps I could. The Great Gatsby weighs heavy on my heart with its tragic longing and beauty, but feels as if it comes from a mind sculpted differently to my own. Keegan writes about situations and topics I know and makes them as beautiful as Gatsby. She writes about her junk-filled car and creates an essay filled with literary treasure. She taught me that profound thoughts don't just happen, they are made in the mind by the significance and narrative we give them. 

The Opposite of Loneliness is the title of the graduation essay that went viral. It's subject and feeling can be summed up best in a phrase used by Keegan in an email to her professor - 'premature nostalgia'. If you have ever been part of a community you have loved, one that you will have to leave some day, if you are young but can already feel the days slipping out from beneath you, you should read this essay. Writing that makes your stomach hurt in the best way, that bleeds anticipation and uncertainty, that makes you feel nostalgic for something you've never known. Keegan's writing is the reason I write, and her graduation essay is the reason I remind myself to be grateful for where I am now - a place where I know 'the opposite of loneliness'.

The title essay The Opposite of Loneliness is here if you would like to read it, and the book is here.

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