Memoirs - do we really need hardbacks of celeb lives?

Royal bombshell, Prince Harry, has sparked debate over the release of his expose-all autobiography. The cathartic nature of writing about past traumas has grown as a popular form of therapy, particularly in an era where you can’t even read the back of a cereal box without seeing some sort of self-care quote telling you to ‘live, laugh, love’ over your bowl of Weetabix. However, the brutal depiction of one of the most talked about institutions since the Tudors made royal gossip a staple in society, has produced a feeling of resentment towards oversharing.

Spare, on one hand, has shown how the fake news and tabloid stories that plague our perception of celebrities can be set straight through the memoir- allowing for a real understanding of the lives that have been defined by OK! Magazine headlines. That being said, feeding into the establishment by giving them more information to exploit seems to be a backwards way of staying out of the spotlight. It can be comforting to know that even the royal family have sibling squabbles but I personally didn’t need the validation from Prince Harry himself that I'm not alone in getting annoyed at my sister for breaking my necklace.

The pool of worthwhile memoirs stacked on the shelves of waterstones is diluted by the likes of Paris Hilton. Offering life advice on retail therapy, dumbing yourself down to attract men, and dedicating a whole chapter to her chihuahua- Paris: The Memoir certainly isn’t for everyone. One could argue that just because our problems aren’t all the same, it doesn’t mean they are not valid. Having said that, when Justin Bieber wrote in his teen memoir First Step 2 Forever that his most horrific life experience to date was that he ‘flunked his drivers test’, it appeared a slightly embarrassing confession, and not just because we now know he couldn’t parallel park at 16. Maybe we should at least have passed puberty before drip feeding superficial problems to the world via hardback.

So, what makes a memoir actually worth publishing?

If we look back on the lives of Anne Frank or Vera Brittain, writing their harrowing stories of living through some of the worst years in history, the case for the validation of memoirs is solid- their stories are inspiring, important and beautifully written.

This doesn’t mean I am suggesting that we have to have lived through a world war to have a life worth writing about. Some of the most interesting memoirs are written by people who have made mistakes, big mistakes. No one wants to read about someone's perfect life.

That's how Dolly Alderton’s Everything I Know About Love became a university girls classic. Her acclaimed memoir is composed of snippets of her hilariously chaotic life polished off with a didactic tone about the importance of female friendships. Tiffany Haddish’s honesty in The Last Black Unicorn is a perfect balance of dating horrors and the complicated nature of domestic violence. Even Phill Collins’ Not Dead Yet deserves a shoutout - he practically resurrected himself through his memoir, reminding us that the renowned drummer is in fact not dead yet. People will buy what they want to read - if Justin wants to write about what shampoo he uses, isn’t it better for beliebers to hear it from the source himself?

Prince Harry’s memoir has sparked a broader discussion about the value of memoirs in today’s landscape. The tell-all was praised in many ways, including its honesty, albeit slightly too heavy on the candour at times. But as the literary world enters the modern age, it embraces the diverse narratives, reflecting the rich social scene that has risen out of the diminishing of privacy. In an age where everything is at our fingertips, it is the personal, unfiltered accounts that resonate so deeply.

Memoirs appear in various forms and what ultimately makes them worthwhile is their ability to connect with readers on different levels, whether they are deeply inspiring or able to just make you laugh on a sunday evening with their relatable anecdotes. While some are attracted to the heartwrenching but historically important accounts of the war, others are more drawn to the relatability and light-hearted humour of the wild tales of a university student. The essence of memoirs lies in the ability to build a bridge between authors and readers, humanising experiences we all share in some way, bringing comfort to many. Personally, I might give Spare 2 a miss.