Ben: The Writer in Mourning
Youth Ambassador Ben shares a piece of writing he calls 'The Writer in Mourning' to explore the subject of writing about grief.
I've written this piece for National Writing Day, on behalf of Child Bereavement UK.
The task of the writer appears to be a simple one, to arrange words in a manner that conveys thought, feeling, argument or instruction. But when the topic of discussion enters into a realm of the unsayable, what becomes of the writer's work? When language cannot comprehend the situation by which we find ourselves, failing to express that feeling, what remains of the writer's attempt to construct that piece of work?
It is this situation by which I identify the writer in mourning. That when the writer finds themselves within the pangs of grief, the use of words to convey that distinct experience so often fails to successfully convey that irreparable feeling. For how could words alone summarise that all encompassing experience, that fundamental transformation of one's being. The black damask of grief that shrouds over our experience pushes that language to its limitations, till it reaches a point of potential impossibility.
This is the central problem within grief writing, that language always exists within certain confines. Each word has a clear definition, point and use, therefore our vocabulary by which to describe grief is limited by those same definitions and the accessibility of the language by which we attempt that discussion. But what escapes the confines of definition is the person for whom we grieve. Irreducible to a collection of stories and descriptions, limitless in the possibilities by which they may be discussed. To attempt a piece of writing that encompasses that person is thereby impossible, no word successfully conveys our feeling toward them, nor any length of work could summarise that person in their entirety.
It is this paradoxical relationship that makes the possibility of discussing grief so difficult, and is the situation in which the grieving writer finds themselves. I myself have made countless attempts at committing to paper what feelings I experience, and the various fluctuations by which grief presents itself. But no one piece of work, nor collected volume would come close to accurately conveying the experience of bereavement.
But that is not to say that these attempts have been fruitless. While the above conclusions present a bleak account of languages possibility, I do not believe that this means hope is lost for the grieving writer, nor that we should abandon the attempt to convey that grief. Instead as I have indicated above, grief is limitless in its multifaceted nature, from an individual basis it cannot be contained nor summarised, and between others it presents itself in a range of different forms. While this means that grief cannot necessarily be confined by language or ever reach a conclusion. The contrary is that language offers a continual method by which to express those limitless possibilities. The grieving writer is not confined to hopeless attempts at writing an everlong work of macabre sentiments.
Instead the writer exists with a creative liberty towards death, by which they may express its effects in a vast multitude of forms. The language upon which a piece of grief writing is constructed is not one that attempts to summarise or conclude certain arguments. But language is instead a tool, utilised as a method by which to express an inconceivable subject.
While this perhaps means that the work of grief is never completed, I do not believe this should be our aim. Instead, while both grief and language exist before the writer as irreducible in their nature, we are presented with an unforetold possibility. A resolution in which pushing at the confines of language is pushing at the confines of grief itself. Exploring grief's limitless nature within the infinite combinations of word forms by which we express those limitless sentiments. The writer is offered a tragic possibility in grief, a pool in which to dive within the confines of language. The ability to produce a concise expression of grief may prove impossible, therefore we are free to continually express an irreducible sentiment. Grief thereby transformed into freedom.
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