Nahas S
I have gone through many youtube videos and other online articles about this subject. But this book, I found quite interesting and helpful. It contains lot of exercise we can practice quite easily which is far better than many others. I would recommend this as a best one within my experience and knowledge. When you start going through the book, even from the beginning you can feel the pace. At the center of Mira Bartok’s memoir about her schizophrenic mother is a beautiful metaphor: a memory palace. The idea, she explains, derives from the sixth-century B.C. Greek poet Simonides, who was attending a party at a palace and stepped outside just before the building collapsed. Because he could recall where all the other guests had been standing, Simonides alone could identify the mangled bodies. Inspired by this tale, a 16th-century Jesuit priest recommended a mental technique by which scholars could build an imaginary palace to keep their memories safe, creating a visual image for everything they wanted to recall and creating a particular place for the image inside the mental palace. It is easy to see why Simonides’ story — a fable about the importance of memory — speaks to Bartok, who has constructed a life on the rubble of a catastrophically ruined family. “The Memory Palace” begins in the final days of her mother’s life, when Bartok finds out that the woman she has not seen in 17 years is dying and decides to go to her.
4 people found this review helpful
El Batrawy
I have gone through many youtube videos and other online articles about this subject. But this book, I found quite interesting and helpful. It contains lot of exercise we can practice quite easily which is far better than many others. I would recommend this as a best one within my experience and knowledge. When you start going through the book, even from the beginning you can feel the pace. At the center of Mira Bartok’s memoir about her schizophrenic mother is a beautiful metaphor: a memory palace. The idea, she explains, derives from the sixth-century B.C. Greek poet Simonides, who was attending a party at a palace and stepped outside just before the building collapsed. Because he could recall where all the other guests had been standing, Simonides alone could identify the mangled bodies. Inspired by this tale, a 16th-century Jesuit priest recommended a mental technique by which scholars could build an imaginary palace to keep their memories safe, creating a visual image for everything they wanted to recall and creating a particular place for the image inside the mental palace. It is easy to see why Simonides’ story — a fable about the importance of memory — speaks to Bartok, who has constructed a life on the rubble of a catastrophically ruined family. “The Memory Palace” begins in the final days of her mother’s life, when Bartok finds out that the woman she has not seen in 17 years is dying and decides to go to her.
Ashish Bajaj
The Memory Palace is a breathtaking literary memoir about the complex meaning of love, truth, and the capacity for forgiveness among family. "People have abandoned their loved ones for much less than you’ve been through," Mira Bartók is told at her mother’s memorial service. It is a poignant observation about the relationship between Mira, her sister, and their mentally ill mother. Before she was struck with schizophrenia at the age of nineteen, beautiful piano protégé Norma Herr had been the most vibrant personality in the room. She loved her daughters and did her best to raise them well, but as her mental state deteriorated, Norma spoke less about Chopin and more about Nazis and her fear that her daughters would be kidnapped, murdered, or raped. When the girls left for college, the harassment escalated--Norma called them obsessively, appeared at their apartments or jobs, threatened to kill herself if they did not return home. After a traumatic encounter, Mira and her sister were left with no choice but to change their names and sever all contact with Norma in order to stay safe. But while Mira pursued her career as an artist--exploring the ancient romance of Florence, the eerie mysticism of northern Norway, and the raw desert of Israel--the haunting memories of her mother were never far away. Then one day, Mira’s life changed forever after a debilitating car accident. As she struggled to recover from a traumatic brain injury, she was confronted with a need to recontextualize her life--she had to relearn how to paint, read, and interact with the outside world. In her search for a way back to her lost self, Mira reached out to the homeless shelter where she believed her mother was living and discovered that Norma was dying. Mira and her sister traveled to Cleveland, where they shared an extraordinary reconciliation with their mother that none of them had thought possible. At the hospital, Mira discovered a set of keys that opened a storage unit Norma had been keeping for seventeen years. Filled with family photos, childhood toys, and ephemera from Norma’s life, the storage unit brought back a flood of previous memories that Mira had thought were lost to her forever. The Memory Palace is a breathtaking literary memoir about the complex meaning of love, truth, and the capacity for forgiveness among family. Through stunning prose and original art created by the author in tandem with the text, The Memory Palace explores the connections between mother and daughter that cannot be broken no matter how much exists--or is lost--between them.