Memory loss and selective remembering

June 15 | 2020

In my new memoir, The Smallest Objective, the themes of willed forgetfulness and selective remembering are foremost. Racism, now so much on our minds, entails both of these. In discriminating against others, we “forget” their humanity, their entitlement to equal rights and opportunities, and the suffering they endure. If we remember related history, we are apt to do so selectively, too often eliminating the events that make us ashamed or uncomfortable. The form of racism that afflicts some characters in The Smallest Objective happens to be anti-Semitism, but all forms of discrimination—whether arising from race, colour, gender, or sexual orientation—are to be condemned.  

---