Living on Repeat: Constructing a Voice for Age-Related Memory Loss

Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment (aMCI), generally, is diagnosed when a person’s memory range is below that of what is expected of people their own age. This involves a steep decline in memory function, usually in a person who is later in life, that does not otherwise affect basic cognitive skills. Yet, even as the field of MCI studies grows, the condition has rarely, if ever, been specifically addressed in literary works or examined in literary studies though MCI affects tens of millions of people. And though many scholars assert the importance of facilitating understanding of dementia and other cognitive disorders through fictional representations (Bladon, 2019; Falcus and Sako, 2019), what is possibly aMCI is generally presented as a precursor to—or symptom of—dementia or Alzheimer’s, or else as unidentified geriatric memory loss. This minimizes the impact of aMCI by presenting a debilitating condition either as a symptom or as a normal part of aging.

This paper explores how qualitative research and critical analysis can be utilised to create a fictional voice for age-related memory loss. My goal is to animate and offer new directions in literary fiction through the process of writing my novel-in-progress, which is told from the perspective of a septuagenarian living with aMCI. I will discuss my current research study—undertaken with Professor of Neuropsychology Catherine Loveday and in conjunction with the eldercare charity Age UK—combining these findings with 1) critical analyses of linguistic study via “mind style,” 2) literary studies involving character development without the use of memory, and 3) neuropsychological investigations into how the mind functions with age-related memory loss. My goal is to contribute to the existing field of age-related memory-loss literature via the practice of fiction writing, taking up what Jonathan Sterne (2021, p. 13) suggests is one of the aims of a “phenomenology of impairment,” namely, “how to account for an experience of self that is unstable and ultimately not fully available.”
Ultimately, through a discussion of my methods and a reading of my novel-in-progress, I will demonstrate how the creation of a fictional voice for aMCI will offer new narrative possibilities that provide both a literal and metaphorical altered path; one that allows the character to change his relationship with time and prioritises the immediate environs of his experience, shifting from a defunct view of selfhood—i.e. the creation and accumulation of achievements and memories—to a transformed self via an unconventional narrative. This follows Stephen Katz and Annette Leibing’s assertion that a potential result of memory-loss narratives (and, I argue, the potential of narratives charting any life course) is to “enlarge the scope of personhood itself, as belonging to a wider community of diverse citizens” (2023, p. 65). By reflexively narrating my methods of creating a fictional voice for the subjective terrain of cognitive impairment, this talk demonstrates how such a voice can challenge representational modes and literary conventions of age-related memory loss.

Bibliography
Bladon, H. (2019). Using Fiction to Increase Empathy and Understanding in Dementia Care. Nursing Times, [online] 115(12), pp.47–49.
Falcus, S. and Sako, K. (2019). Contemporary Narratives of Dementia. Routledge. doi:https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315617534.
Leibing, A. and Katz, S. (2023). Lost in Time like Tears in Rain: Critical Perspectives on Personhood and Dementia. In: R. Ward and L.J. Sandberg, eds., Critical Dementia Studies an Introduction. Routledge, pp.57–72.
Sterne, J. (2021). Diminished Faculties. Duke University Press.