Summary Of All Souls By Michael Macdonald

Michael MacDonald’s memoir All Souls captures a time and place of unrest with such finesse that in my own memoir piece I can only hope to produce a fraction of the masterpiece that he has created. The reader, as an outsider, receives a deep as well as insightful portrait of 1970’s and 80’s Southie. MacDonald provides a balanced, and therefore seemingly contradictory account of what is was like to grow up in such a violence riddled, drug infested, and all around bleak situation. While MacDonald captures the dispiriting side of Southie, he also illustrates the way in which Southie seemed like a wonderful place to live at the time. He conveys a duality of the people and atmosphere of Southie that is truly enrapturing and engaging. To create such

Through his candid and authentic account of his growing up in Southie, MacDonald draws the reader in and conveys his credibleness as a source of an unbiased narrative. MacDonald takes an unequivocal approach to telling his story in which he does not paint himself, his neighbors, or his family as either sinners or saints. While he does compose reverent portraits of the people of Southie, he also exposes their involvement in the unsavory side of Southie. MacDonald conveys his admiration for his neighbors and family in Southie while disclosing their involvement in the race riots, drug epidemic, mass violence, and Whitey Bulger’s Irish mob. A poignant example such duality in MacDonald’s retelling is his profile of his

He is never really explicit about his personal issues, such as mental illness or substance abuse. Instead, he hints at said issues discreetly through a one liner or by showing the reader, but not explicitly stating it. One such example of this is when he calls his dad on his birthday for the first time and after he casually states “that was the first time I felt depressed” (p ??). A one liner such as this is not a statement that MacDonald “was depressed” it is more passive by him saying that he “felt depressed.” This is only a hint at the real gravity of the problem as it does not register fully with the reader upon first glance that it was a serious issue. MacDonald builds upon these buried statements with his illustrations of him going to the club every night or beginning to drink at a young age. He never mentions explicitly that he has a problem really, but rather leaves it up to the reader to infer such things about him. All these hints combine together to create a portrait of MacDonald where he has depression and a somewhat concerning drinking problem, however he never overbears the reader with it. This technique is admirable to me and I would like to employ it in my own memoir. I am not one who really is all that comfortable with sharing intimate details about myself or my issues, but I know that I need to in order to create an effective