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art_cart_ron 's review for:
Postsecret: Extraordinary Confessions from Ordinary Lives
by Frank Warren
I know this book has been around for a while, and that there have been subsequent collections - but this is the first time I settled down to read it.
Most interesting to me is the way half of it feels shallow, false, and fake. I don't believe a lot of them. A lot a lot. This was edgelord silly high school shenanigans for a lot of people. I feel.
But then there were the 30-40% that were just sad - people who think they should be ashamed of themselves for lots of things that most people feel a lot of the time. People who feel guilty for masturbating? Seriously?
Then there are the 3-5% that put ice in my belly. A lifetime of being treated as less than my sibling felt transformed by a postcard from someone who recognized that they are resented for being conceived before their parents were married. The commonality of abuse of all kinds. The guilt that people live with when they are tangentially connected to a death or break-up. These make it a 4 star book, to me.
Then there was the read I had on the postcards that weren't shared. I believe there was a fairly predictable standard for what was considered safe enough to share. I believe that there were lots of darker and uglier, and triggerier postcards sent. Confessions about parentage, bullying, and definitely violence (there is a blinding dearth of confessions about violence - maybe with the belief that it would validate more violence). Trouble is: the book stops being fully human when that editing happens. Much of the reason we have continued abuse and trauma is because of our failure to own its reality and commonality.
So - - I'm interested in the book that follows this one, maybe in 20 years. The one composed by someone who is disinterested in the role of editing the secrets of others. The composer who relinquishes the task of editing the nature of human secrets.
Most interesting to me is the way half of it feels shallow, false, and fake. I don't believe a lot of them. A lot a lot. This was edgelord silly high school shenanigans for a lot of people. I feel.
But then there were the 30-40% that were just sad - people who think they should be ashamed of themselves for lots of things that most people feel a lot of the time. People who feel guilty for masturbating? Seriously?
Then there are the 3-5% that put ice in my belly. A lifetime of being treated as less than my sibling felt transformed by a postcard from someone who recognized that they are resented for being conceived before their parents were married. The commonality of abuse of all kinds. The guilt that people live with when they are tangentially connected to a death or break-up. These make it a 4 star book, to me.
Then there was the read I had on the postcards that weren't shared. I believe there was a fairly predictable standard for what was considered safe enough to share. I believe that there were lots of darker and uglier, and triggerier postcards sent. Confessions about parentage, bullying, and definitely violence (there is a blinding dearth of confessions about violence - maybe with the belief that it would validate more violence). Trouble is: the book stops being fully human when that editing happens. Much of the reason we have continued abuse and trauma is because of our failure to own its reality and commonality.
So - - I'm interested in the book that follows this one, maybe in 20 years. The one composed by someone who is disinterested in the role of editing the secrets of others. The composer who relinquishes the task of editing the nature of human secrets.