Why We Love (Or Love To Hate) Memoirs

NEAL CONAN, host:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan in Washington.

Memoirs, we may love them, hate them or mock them, but we also devour them, from Frederick Douglass's multiple accounts of his journey from slavery to Sarah Palin going rogue, the experiences, triumphs and maybe especially the sufferings of others in their own words have enthralled us for centuries. And with the explosion of blogging and reality TV, it's apparent everybody has a story to tell. In his new book, journalist and author Ben Yagoda chronicles the long history of the autobiography and of our fascination with it. Perhaps you've dreamed of writing your own memoirs, well, what would you call it? You can't use "Play by Play: Baseball, Radio and Life in the Last Chance League." That one's been taken.

So what would you have to do if you had to come up with your own memoir title? Our phone number is 800-989-8255. Email us, talk@npr.org. You can also join the conversation on our Web site. That's at npr.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION.

Ben Yagoda teaches journalism at the University of Delaware and writes books. His most recent is "Memoir: A History," and he joins us today from a studio in Philadelphia. Thanks very much for being with us.

Professor BEN YAGODA (Author, "Memoir: A History"): It's my pleasure to be here, Neal.

CONAN: And we think of - well, memoir is a relatively new genre, but as you write in your book, people have felt the need to write their stories since we invented writing.

Prof. YAGODA: Absolutely. Roughly a 2,060-year history is what I chronicle in the book.

CONAN: Caesar is basically where you begin.

Prof. YAGODA: That's where I begin, right, with his third-person chronicle of his battle successes. That's, at least by my measure, the first autobiography or memoir. Neither word had been invented at that time, but that's what we call them today.

CONAN: And indeed like millions of others, I was forced to translate them, but nevertheless, these were a politician's memoirs with an axe to grind. He writes these with a purpose.

Prof. YAGODA: Absolutely. He wanted to show himself in a good light, and one - they were written, as I said, in the third person, as Norman Mailer did and Henry Adams did in later years. And one scholar's theory was that it was appropriate because they were going to be read from various mountainsides from town to town by other people than Caesar, so the third person was appropriate.

CONAN: And he also did another device, which has proved useful to subsequent followers of his craft. He built up his enemies so that he would look even better for having defeated them.

Prof. YAGODA: Crafty, very crafty, yes.

CONAN: Well, at least we remember Vercingetorix.

Prof. YAGODA: Exactly.

CONAN: Exactly. Now, it is also nothing new that we mock memoirs. You quoted an 18th-century German philosopher who trashed the egotistical neurotics who cannot let themselves leave the world without commentaries.

Prof. YAGODA: Right. And you know, if I had started the book with that quote and hadn't identified when and where it was written, it could have been done this year, 10 years ago, in response to our more recent memoir boom, which started about 15, 20 years ago.

CONAN: And this - why do you suspect it has happened in the most recent, in this most recent boom?

Prof. YAGODA: Well, I think a number of factors converged. Maybe the most important is success. The success of books like "Angela's Ashes" by Frank McCourt and "The Liars' Club" by Mary Karr in the early to mid-'90s engendered copycats, books - people wanted to duplicate that kind of success. But also I think culturally, you know, it was the era of Oprah, Bill Clinton, feeling each other's pain. There was something that just seemed appropriate to share your story, even if you weren't a well-known, prominent person, with the rest of the world, and the rest of the world seemed to want to read it.

CONAN: Stories that in another time might have been told in a first novel.

Prof. YAGODA: Right. And that was a big change. I mean, through the 20th century, up until that, say, last 20 years, that was traditional. Your first novel was that autobiographical one, and a very striking contrast is "The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath, came out in the late '50s, early '60s, and "Girl, Interrupted," that came out 30-plus years later. Similar story, took place in the same psychiatric facility. The one was a novel with the main character's name changed. The name of the facility changed. Second was a memoir, not only no names changed but in the very first page was the admissions paper of the person with her address, parent's name, diagnosis, everything.

CONAN: So that this is - that is emblematic of the change. Yet there is a difference between the roman a clef and the memoir. One, well, you're allowed to take some liberties with the facts, the other, well, maybe not so much.

Prof. YAGODA: Well, people disagree on that. I think there was a bit of an understanding that liberties could be taken with the memoir, yet no one quite agreed on how much liberties could, what the extent of it could be, until the James Frey "A Million Little Pieces" scandal of a few years ago, when people were forced to confront that issue of how many liberties could be taken. You know, and I still think there is not a consensus on that, but at least that question is out there in writers' minds, editors' minds, maybe will never be resolved, but it is a pressing question.

CONAN: Well, it's one thing - in a way, you know if you're reading someone's memoir, and they're reciting dialogue precisely as it happened 50 years ago, that maybe this is not exactly as it happened. Nevertheless, making up things out of whole cloth, like your time in prison - there are lines.

Prof. YAGODA: Right, or you're being raised a foster child in a, you know, black neighborhood when you really were raised in Sherman Oaks, as the Margaret Jones, Margaret Seltzer case, right.

CONAN: Or the Indian writer who portrayed himself as, you know, a mystic - a Native American who turned out to be a hustler.

Prof. YAGODA: Right. Nazditch(ph) - I'm not sure how it's pronounced.

CONAN: I'm not sure how he pronounces it, either.

Prof. YAGODA: Right, or if it even is pronounced, (unintelligible). Yeah, there's certain clear-cut cases where it's just a total crock, yet as you point out with this issue of dialogue - and it's definitely expected that every memoir today has to have dialogue and scenes just because that makes it readable - it's not going to be 100 percent accurate. So there is some poetic license, and that I guess is part of what makes it a difficult question. You know, you and I - you know, I happen to remember that I interviewed you about 10 years ago. You may not remember that, or you may remember it, but you may remember it differently than I did. And I could in all good conscience write my account of it, and you write your account of it, and it'll seem very different.

CONAN: And they'll seem very different, yes.

Prof. YAGODA: Yeah, and so some of that has got to be there. I guess clearly, intentional fabrication, intentional fictionalization, I think we can agree that's problematic.

CONAN: And when it tends to lead towards sensationalism. That's when it really is over the line.

Prof. YAGODA: Red flags go up, absolutely.

CONAN: There's another thing we have to definitionally get to before we start taking suggestions for titles from our callers, and that is the difference between a memoir, memoirs plural and autobiography. There are some distinctions, not so much between the last two, though.

Prof. YAGODA: Well, there are. It kind of depends who's making the distinctions, and those three words that you mentioned - memoir, memoirs, autobiography - the connotation has changed over time.

But I guess my sense nowadays, in 2009, no one writes memoirs anymore. That's an outdated term. Memoir could be a whole life, part of a life, a well-known person, a not-well-known person. Autobiography is strictly the entire life, and that's one distinction. And prominent people tend to write an autobiography, although Andre Agassi's book was a memoir. So it's - there's nothing exact about the terminology.

CONAN: Well, his tennis career may be over. He'd like to think maybe his life isn't over yet.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Prof. YAGODA: Right, well, you can never write your whole life because you can't plan on dying the moment you, you know, write the last period of the book, but autobiography is your life up - your complete life up until now.

CONAN: Up until you hand the manuscript to the publisher. We're talking�

Prof. YAGODA: Right, then there's part two.

CONAN: We're talking - well, or - well, anyway, we'll go on - there's other things about sequels and people running out of life to memorialize. But anyway, Ben Yagoda's our guest. He's the author of "Memoir: A History," and he's joining us from Philadelphia.

If you wrote a memoir, what would the title be? Give us a call, 800-989-8255. Email us, talk@npr.org. And let's begin with Frank, and Frank's calling from the San Joaquin Valley in California.

FRANK (Caller): Hi, how are you?

Prof. YAGODA: Go ahead, please.

FRANK: Yeah, I would call my memoir, or autobiography, "Why You Look So Familiar." I am an actor. I've been in film and television and in theater, but especially from film and television. I have one of those faces that looks vaguely familiar. They don't know where they know me from, but people think they know me.

And sometimes they'll stare, and then sometimes they'll actually come up and say: Why do you look so familiar?

CONAN: Right, or aren't you Joe Schmegegi who I met once in San Antonio.

Prof. YAGODA: I think someone did write a memoir called "Didn't You Used to Be Someone?"

FRANK: That's the alternate title. The other one would be: "Didn't You Used to be an Actor?" I'll get that occasionally.

CONAN: Every once in a while. Frank, go break a leg, okay?

FRANK: Thanks a lot.

CONAN: All right, bye-bye. Here's some tweets we have from Krupali(ph). "Life is a Bowl of Garlic Hummus." That's not too bad. I think that might move a few - move a little product. MasterofPR tweet: "Setting the Bar Too High: A Journey Toward Perfection." And that's - but that finds the typical construction for titles of a short, pithy phrase followed by a semi-colon.

Prof. YAGODA: A semi - yeah, or a colon. In the show-business autobiographies, there have been some great ones and great titles. One of the favorites that I remember was on my parents' bookshelves when I was a kid was by a forgotten-to-me actress named Ilka Chase: "Past Imperfect."

CONAN: Oh, that's nice. I like that. And just - and no subtitle. That's even better.

Prof. YAGODA: Right.

CONAN: Here's a tweet from YoYology: "Tangled up in Words: A Knitter's Reading Life."

Prof. YAGODA: Ooh, that has - that could have legs.

CONAN: That's got some onion layers to it. Here's - let's get another caller on the line. This is Carol, Carol with us from Godfrey in Illinois.

CAROL (Caller): Hi, how are you?

CONAN: I'm good, Carol, how are you today?

CAROL: Good, thank you. If I were to write my autobiography, I would called it "Come Sit Next To Me." This is from a quotation by Alice Roosevelt Longworth. She had a pillow embroidered for her sofa that said: If you can't say anything good about anyone, come sit next to me.

(Soundbite of laughter)

CAROL: So I've been a...

Prof. YAGODA: That's a good story, yeah.

CAROL: I've been a lobbyist with the Illinois General Assembly for about 25, 30 years, and there are a lot of stories waiting to be told. I have to wait till some of the people are dead, though, because...

CONAN: They might have lawyers.

CAROL: They are lawyers.

CONAN: Even worse.

CAROL: But that's my plan, to tell some funny stories and then maybe some - offer some thought-provoking ideas for how to improve that system...

CONAN: Carol, we will wish you both the best of luck and a Merry Christmas.

CAROL: Thank you.

CONAN: Bye-bye. Stay with us. We're talking with Ben Yagoda about his book, "Memoir: A History." I'm Neal Conan. It's the TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.

CONAN: This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan in Washington. The desire to tell your own story is deeply human, one we've indulged for centuries. We call it memoir, and there have been a few James Freys, okay, but there's also been Henry Adams and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, heck, even Julius Caesar.

We're talking with author Ben Yagoda about his book, "Memoir: A History." If you'd like to read his chapter on what he calls shtick-lit, more on that in just a moment, you can read it at our Web site. That's at npr.org.

And if you were to write your own story, give us a call. What's your memoir's title? 800-989-8255. Email us, talk@npr.org. You can also join the conversation on our Web site. That's at npr.org. Click on TALK OF THE NATION.

And Ben Yagoda, what is shtick-lit?

Prof. YAGODA: Shtick-lit is a wonderful term that I believe was coined by Sarah Goldstein(ph), and it's basically doing a stunt or project, usually takes one year, conveniently, for the sake of writing a memoir about it.

And the most recent trend of it I believe was started by a woman named Norah Vincent, who wrote a book...

CONAN: A guest on this program.

Prof. YAGODA: "Self-Made Man: One Woman's Journey into Manhood and Back." And I think she's also written more recently another book in that genre. And then memorably, A.J. Jacobs - he's probably the reigning prince of the genre - wrote a book about following the rules of the Bible for a year, taking a year to read the Encyclopedia Brittanica to become the smartest man in the world, and so on and so forth.

CONAN: A lot of them have got the subtitle that plays on "The Year of Living Dangerously."

Prof. YAGODA: Right, the year of living virtuously, or the year of whatever. I kind of have the sense that that's been just a little bit played out, and thankfully so.

CONAN: You, in fact trace it to Henry David Thoreau, who actually spent two years on Walden Pond, but in order to get the subtitle right condensed it to one.

Prof. YAGODA: Right, and you know, Nellie Bly faked being insane to investigate a madhouse, and Jack London pretended to be poor, and a notable historical book, "Black Like Me," John Howard Griffin pretended to be black and so forth. So definitely historical precedence for these, as I found in doing the book that there was pretty much a historical precedent for any single type of memoir one sees today, just not so many of them.

CONAN: Not so many. Let's get another caller in. George is on the line from Charlotte.

GEORGE (Caller): Hey, how are you?

CONAN: Good, George. What's your memoir's title?

GEORGE: Well, after hearing all those great titles, mine doesn't sound quite as interesting. Mine is called "Addicted to Sin."

CONAN: "Addicted to Sin," and what were those particular sins?

GEORGE: Well, the reason I chose that title, well, is because I'm a recovering sex and drug addict and have lived quite a life of darkness there for a long time.

CONAN: So this is a rich vein of memoir, is it not, Ben Yagoda?

GEORGE: Oh, it would be a true memoir, and you know, I'd be covering an awful lot of areas that, you know, but that would be my title. It certainly, you know, might catch some attention, but I'm not sure it's quite as creative as a lot of stuff I've been hearing while I'm on hold.

Prof. YAGODA: Well, it certainly is an age-old theme. So I encourage you to go ahead and give that a shot. It sounds like you have some good material.

GEORGE: Okay..

CONAN: Malcolm X made it work for him, so...

Prof. YAGODA: Absolutely.

CONAN: Yeah. George, thanks very much. Just in that vein, there were books by Iceberg Slim that I always found very fascinating, his life as a pimp.

Prof. YAGODA: I know, and traditionally urban libraries, that is the most-requested and most-stolen book, and that was - you know, there have been so many tens of thousands of memoirs and autobiographies written that I couldn't get to every one, and that is actually one that I wish I had spent a little more time on. But I didn't.

CONAN: Here's one from - tweet from LarcenyCrook: "How to Do It All Wrong and Still Be Okay With It." And KasimirKapaki(ph): "Memoirs of the Hearing Child." That's pretty intriguing. It already gets you thinking about, well, wait a minute, what do you mean about the hearing child? That's pretty good.

Prof. YAGODA: I like it, it was the other one. Yeah, and the problem, though, getting back to the gentleman's call of the memoirs of alcoholism and drug addiction, is the issue of what do you remember? And that issue came up when Keith Richards a couple of years ago signed a deal to write his memoirs - and for a very lucrative amount -interestingly still have not appeared. So I'm not sure exactly how much he's going to be able to remember, but I'll be interested to see when that comes out.

CONAN: Let's go to Heidi, Heidi with us from Sacramento.

HEIDI (Caller): Hi.

CONAN: Hi.

HEIDI: I'm huge fans of both you guys.

CONAN: Oh, thank you.

HEIDI: Uh-huh. So my title actually is a working title because I am working on my memoir. It would be an episodic memoir. Basically, I'm ripping off George Orwell's "Down and Out in London and Paris." So it would be "Down and Out" - dot dot dot - "In Pretty Much Every City I've Ever Lived In."

(Soundbite of laughter)

CONAN: It's been used for a movie, "Down and Out in Beverly Hills."

HEIDI: Yeah, there's that as well. I would be referencing a lot of, obviously...

CONAN: Cultural touchstones, yes.

HEIDI: Yes, exactly.

Prof. YAGODA: You might want to mention one or two of the cities to just whet people's appetite.

HEIDI: Okay, I'll tell you: Johannesburg; Sacramento, which is where I am now; New York City, where I went to college and grad school; Oxford, London; Paris...

Prof. YAGODA: I'll stick with - stick with the Johannesburg and Sacramento. That...

HEIDI: Oh, you think?

CONAN: That's a nice contrast too.

HEIDI: Yeah, that's true.

Prof. YAGODA: It would make me want to read on.

HEIDI: That's true. In any case, the funny thing is I'm a journalist, and so my instinct is not to write about myself, and I've always got editors saying put more of yourself in the story, put more of yourself in the story, and my feeling is always like I'm not the story, but apparently I am.

Prof. YAGODA: It's interesting that one of the more recent trends that I think is a very good one is the reported memoir. So David Carr of the New York Times...

HEIDI: Yes, I love that book.

Prof. YAGODA: He had drug problems, as he writes about and we just talked about, and didn't trust his memory, and memory is a very faulty instrument anyway. So he went back and interviewed the other people who were involved in that part of his life and came out with a wonderful book.

HEIDI: No, it's great, and then he says he concedes that he misremembers the most important night of his life, which was the night that he apparently was brandishing a gun, and a friend of his remembers it differently, and I think it's really brave - well, it's obviously brave of him to expose himself to that level. And the other thing is, he went back and he got the truth. I mean, even though he's a reporter and probably his memory is very, very good, in spite of the fact he was, like, high most of the time, you know, he went back and he got documentation, and he got eyewitnesses, and it was crazy.

CONAN: Heidi, let me ask. As you're writing about yourself, though, don't you find yourself in an odd way become a character, and it's you but it's not quite you?

HEIDI: Oh yeah, absolutely. That's the only way you can write about yourself is to distance yourself from it, because otherwise you feel like it's a cartoon.

CONAN: It's a very strange experience, yeah. Anyway, good luck with the book.

HEIDI: Thank you very much. Good luck, you guys.

CONAN: Here's an email from Jody(ph) in Alameda, California. My mother-in-law, who was divorced after four kids and 12-plus years of marriage, always swore if she wrote a memoir, she'd title it "Two Twenties for a Forty," a commentary on the younger women her ex-husband went on to date after her divorce.

Prof. YAGODA: Sad story, but you know, it's interesting listening to her talk about writing about yourself and the difficulties one has as a journalist. The number one clich� of a writing class, writing instruction, is always, you know, write about what you know, and that's there for a reason, which is that when you know the subject, you tend to write more strong prose, authoritative. And so that's the number one reason, I would say, for the continuing popularity of this genre, the memoir boom, that in the right hands, in the hands of a good writer with a story to tell, it can make totally riveting reading.

CONAN: Yeah, you've left a strong caveat there though: In the hands of a strong writer.

Prof. YAGODA: I did want to make sure to say that because, you know, after all, sometimes you feel like saying don't try this at home. You have to have a command of the language and a level of insight and all those things, which are not little things, but it's not that they are so esoteric either.

So you know, when I teach classes in non-fiction writing at University of Delaware, I wouldn't venture to have a whole book-length - my students do a whole book-length memoir, but shorter pieces, they really do a great job with it because it's something they know and they own and they can work on and develop. So it's a great form.

CONAN: It's also worth pointing out that you may want to live a lot of life before you start writing memoir because you can start to run out of it after four or five serials.

Prof. YAGODA: Well, that is an issue, and you know, Mary Karr, who I mentioned earlier, it seems to me she's done it well. She just came out with her third memoir called "Lit" - and the first one, "Liars' Club," the second one, "Cherry" - for each one, I don't know how many years, 10, 15, 20 years had passed between the experience and the writing of the book.

By contrast, Julie Powell, who wrote "Julie & Julia," which was a really cool book about her blog about doing all of Julia Child's cookbook - a great story - that ended. It was a great success. There was a demand to write another book, and she hadn't lived anything yet. So I think some of the critics are expressing a little displeasure with that.

CONAN: I saw a quote from David Sedaris who says he's now down to writing memoirs about being on book tours.

Prof. YAGODA: Yeah, and David Sedaris can do it very well, but that's a very high level of humor and literary ability.

CONAN: Here's an email from Tom in Bend, Oregon. Now, a memoir or history - now, if it's turned into an audiobook, wouldn't it be properly termed an audiobiography?

Prof. YAGODA: Hmm.

CONAN: Ooh.

Prof. YAGODA: A punster.

CONAN: A punster. Yes, the most elevated form of humor.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Prof. YAGODA: Right.

CONAN: This is from T. Denly(ph): "Building a Life That Counts: A Mathematician's Memoir."

Prof. YAGODA: Hmm. You know, I'm not sure if the sales of the bestseller list was quite ready for the mathematician's memoir but it could happen, it could happen.

CONAN: You never know.

Prof. YAGODA: No.

CONAN: Let's go to David(ph). David with us from Nashville.

DAVID (Caller): Yes. David here - I was a chaplain at Tennessee State Penitentiary from 1972 to 1982 - 1973 to '83, excuse me, chaplain there and this would be "The Walls Speak," that was the nickname for the prison was The Walls. So if you went to The Walls, you went to Tennessee State Penitentiary. This prison was for a period of time, would have been described as a most violent prison in America. My memories are a stabbing a week, a fatality a month. But that prison also had its own distinct culture and charm in some sense.

One story is Geronmimo the deer: Brushy Mountain Prison in East Tennessee, where James Earl Ray was housed as well as our place, had a pet deer. This was brought in as a fawn. And that deer when they closed Brushy Mountain due to a guard strike the deer was left behind but later brought to our prison. And to my amazement when I first start there, I see this deer walking down a sidewalk. It was a convict deer. It would actually take commissary groceries from inmates if they didn't offer it freely. While at the prison an inmate struck the deer on its leg, broke a leg and the deer had his leg set by a veterinarian, gangrene set in. The deer had to be destroyed. Inmates raised a thousand dollars for the assassination of the inmate who had done this to Geronimo.

CONAN: Done the dirty deed to Geronimo. Wow, that's a great story. I did remember seeing the autobiography of the former warden of a famous prison in New York called "Ten Thousand Years in Sing Sing," so.

Prof. YAGODA: Well, you know, I think you should go ahead and work on writing this book because it sounds fascinating. The intimate stories -and a lot of these successful memoirs in recent years combine a couple of different sub-genres. So, the prison memoir is a long-standing tradition, the one that Neal mentioned as well. And also, the animal memoir, you know, "Marley and Me," and every other kind of animal. So, I�

CONAN: And eight sequels, yeah.

Prof. YAGODA: And so I think that's worth looking into.

CONAN: David, good luck with that.

DAVID: �film documentary we've got about 90 hours of former inmates, current inmates, wardens, two former governors. We've got about 90 hours filmed. This will be "The Walls Speak" when completed as a documentary of 20 years.

CONAN: Well, get all of that - the outtakes down transcribed. So, you've got accurate quotes to use when you write your book.

DAVID: Yes, exactly.

CONAN: Okay, bye, bye. We're talking with Ben Yagoda about his book "Memoir: A History." You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. This is from Cynthia(ph). Her title "Patient," about my unusual and frustrating experiences in the health care system as I have sought diagnostic closure. I've been thinking about it for a number of years but as I'm private person, it also involves critique of physicians whose real names I would not use but they would recognize themselves. I might also have trouble getting a doctor after that.

(Soundbite of laughter)

CONAN: A good point to make.

Prof. YAGODA: There is that libel issue. Even if you change someone's name and they're recognizable, they can still sue you.

CONAN: Let's get Shawn(ph) on the line. Shawn calling from Denver.

SHAWN (Caller): Hello. I'm currently in the process of writing two and a half fake memoirs.

(Soundbite of laughter)

SHAWN: The first one is about myself as a fake person and it's called "Extraneous Canes Among the Down and Out." The second is a fake memoir about someone else but written in the first person and is called "Gonging the Faloon(ph)."

CONAN: "Gonging the Saloon." I like that.

SHAWN: The faloon.

CONAN: Oh, the faloon.

SHAWN: Yes. And the third one is my dissertation, which is a kind of a memoir but kind of not, and it's called "Cubicle Death Match."

(Soundbite of laughter)

CONAN: That's the best title yet, I think.

Prof. YAGODA: My question is - is this a real call?

(Soundbite of laughter)

SHAWN: Good question.

CONAN: It is a good question. Shawn, merry Christmas.

SHAWN: Thank you very much.

CONAN: Bye, bye. Here's an email from Carra(ph) in Denver. I've written a memoir that's coming out on 2010 called "They Only Eat Their Husbands." It's the story of my nine years in Alaska the year I backpacked - a year - I backpacked around the world alone. The title is based on the first preying mantis I ever saw in a bungalow in Thailand when I answered a German traveler if he thought that mantis might bite me. He told me not to worry, they only eat their husband. I couldn't stop laughing. So that's pretty good.

Prof. YAGODA: And the Alaska memoir, of course, we have Sarah Palin's currently top the bestseller list. So, got a lot of different genres working there as well.

CONAN: Let's go to Kevin(ph). Kevin with us from Seaside in Florida.

KEVIN (Caller): Oh, thanks for taking my call. I really like your show.

CONAN: Oh, thank you.

KEVIN: Well, I'm a self-deprecating comedian actually. And I'm actually from the North and I moved to the South and discovered this wonderful phrase called: bless his heart. So, I want to write my memoir as "Bless His Heart: At Least He Tried." And have it be a third person, kind of, like the Caesar memoir.

CONAN: Yeah.

Prof. YAGODA: It sounds heavily ironic.

KEVIN: Yeah, heavily ironic.

CONAN: But on the other hand this supposed to be the story of your life and I gather from that you've died many times, Kevin.

KEVIN: Yeah, it feels like it, at least through that and through different jobs, but, you know, I think at least I tried would be a good subtitle.

Prof. YAGODA: I think, Neal, he may have been referring to a comedy act.

CONAN: I think so, yes.

KEVIN: Oh, yeah, no I think that's - that's the part. When people come to my show most of time I'm making fun of myself. So, it's a kind of -they don't know if they should laugh or they should come up and hug me. But it's always funny to see their reaction.

CONAN: Thanks very much for the call, Kevin. And good luck with it.

KEVIN: Merry Christmas.

CONAN: Bye, bye. Merry Christmas to you too. And Ben Yagoda, we're going to - wish you happy holidays.

Prof. YAGODA: Thank you so much.

CONAN: Ben Yagoda's new book is "Memoir: A History." He is a professor of journalism at the University of Delaware, joined us today from a studio in Philadelphia.

Coming up next, we're going to be talking about that, well, elusive goal of every toy marketer, the It toy of the year. Well, if you're out there looking for a certain electronic hamster, give us a call: 800-989-8255. Email us, talk@npr.org. Stay with us.

I'm Neal Conan. It's the TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.