Professional Practice External Project: 4 - âA Life Discardedâ with Alexander Masters Event at Mr Bâs Book Shop , 24th May 2016
I saw this event advertised as I walked passed the shop a few weeks before. The book is a biography about 148 dairies that were found in a skip in Cambridge in 2001. The dairies ranged from the first notebook in the 1950âČs to the the last few that looked like they had just been bought, the last submission only a couple of days before the diaries were found. I was fascinated by this discovery and was desperate to know more. My practice holds a lot of relevance to this theme; seeing an insight into a strangers life by exploring it in a way that touches upon ethical issues of privacy. This book made me ask a few questions; has he got into trouble from sharing a strangers information without their consent, or, because the diaries had been thrown away, do they not longer belong to anyone? Did he ever find out who this person was? Did the diarist ever find out he was writing a book based on the exploration of finding the books and the submissions he read?Â
The event was held at Mr Bâs book shop in Bath on Tuesday 24th May. I was at first put off by the price of the event as tickets were £14, but I managed to get a discount when I stressed to the staff how important this would be for my degree.Â
The talk consisted of an interview between Masters and the book seller. Masters explained how the diaries were found and what he decided to do with them. They came in all different types of books ranging through the years. Some were grand with letters embossed on the front, others were basic blank note books. One thing I was extremely fascinated about was the handwriting. He actually brought a selection of diaries to show us. The handwriting held one consistent theme over the years of submissions. The writing appeared obsessive; scrawling words from one edge of the page to the other, and there were absolutely no crossings out. He showed one example of when this person mustâve been a young adult, the writing held an obsessive theme, but the looked like it would be relatively easy to read. He then showed a page from a book that wouldâve been written when the diarist was much older, and the writing is barely recognisable, just rapid squiggles on a page. He showed writing continuing on to the back pages in the books, and even the hard cover. This immediately showed an insight into this person. Whoever they were, they obviously used this writing method as a necessity. Masters claimed that some entries went on for pages and pages, stating that the diarist would have written for two to three hours a day, sometimes even more. Masters had taken the diaries to a graphologist who analysed the writing and helped him making better sense of who this person was.
The interesting thing about reading a strangers dairy is that you arenât introduced to any basic information, for example, their sex. Masters assumed the diarist was a man because of the confident, angry, rapid writing, but he later realised that âheâ was in fact a âsheâ. This is an example of how we make assumptions with people and their lives, when in reality we could be entirely wrong.Â
I found the concept of telling someone else's story through the submissions of the diaries they threw away fascinating. Masters is a biographer who doesnât write about famous people or people who are well known. He tells the stories of ordinary people who have lived extraordinary lives. At some point in the talk he stressed over how passionate he is about this, and is baffled why there arenât enough writers who do anything similar. I asked him if he could discuss this further, is it because people just assume that they canât act upon things like this without seeking consent? Is it an issue related to being out of their comfort zone? itâs much safer to tell a story that came from your own head. He said that there are countless ways to tell stories in this way, you just need to make the effort to find them.
It was very insightful to meet someone who is so fearless to explore the life of someone else in such an intimate way. I saw it as a hint of encouragement to carry on pursuing my curiosity with working with personal hints of information and how to find them.
I am currently reading âA Life Discardedâ by Alexander Masters, which I bought and got signed at the event. Hopefully when I finish the book some of my questions would be answered.














