{"id":518,"date":"2020-07-08T11:20:00","date_gmt":"2020-07-08T18:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/?p=518"},"modified":"2023-05-19T14:28:43","modified_gmt":"2023-05-19T21:28:43","slug":"cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021\/","title":{"rendered":"Cover Story Fall ’20 – Winter ’21"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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< Back to Fall 2020\/Winter 2021<\/a><\/p>\n

Cover Story<\/h1>\n

Memories Are Made of This \u2026<\/h2>\n

Memory forges who we are. It is both a bridge to our past and \u2014 if we succeed in absorbing the lessons it has to offer \u2014 a valuable resource to illuminate our path toward a better future.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

But memory is tricky. A double-edged sword, it brings comfort and joy, pain and regret. \u201cI have a terrible memory; I never forget a thing,\u201d wrote novelist Edith Konecky in 1976.<\/p>\n

Arguably the world\u2019s most celebrated writer about memory, Marcel Proust may have summed it up best almost a hundred years ago: \u201cWe are able to find everything in our memory, which is like a dispensary or chemical laboratory in which chance steers our hand sometimes to a soothing drug and sometimes to a dangerous poison.\u201d The French author and essayist made real for generations of readers the idea of involuntary memory with his unforgettable evocation of how the prosaic act of dunking a small French sponge cake known as a\u00a0madeleine<\/em>\u00a0into his tea as an adult unleashed a flood of childhood experience in his novel\u00a0A La Recherche du Temps Perdu (In Search of Lost Time)<\/em><\/p>\n

Memory is also unreliable. \u201cThere are things I remember which may never have happened, but as I recall them so they take place,\u201d wrote Nobel Prize-winning British playwright Harold Pinter in his Proustian play,\u00a0Old Times<\/em>, in 1971. Or as American novelist, essayist and poet Barbara Kingsolver put it, \u201cMemory is a complicated thing, a relative to truth but not its twin.\u201d<\/p>\n

But if memory has its drawbacks, it also has the power to transport us to paradise. In a letter to a friend in 1879, Emily Dickinson wrote, \u201cI think Heaven will not be as good as earth, unless it bring with it that sweet power to remember, which is the staple of Heaven here.\u201d<\/p>\n

This issue of\u00a0USC Dornsife Magazine<\/em>\u00a0explores memory from many different angles: from a history scholar\u2019s research into the deadly floods of 1861\u201362 to the ways politicians and advertisers create memorable messaging, and from a profile of an alumna who, as a child, escaped the Liberian civil war to begin a new life in the United States to how new technologies are revolutionizing the ways we remember and commemorate those we love and admire.<\/p>\n

Our cover, by graphic designer Dennis Lan, illustrates the vivid private world we all carry with us inside our heads. Dennis wrote of his inspiration, \u201cMy main idea is how digging into memory can be an inward-looking adventure. I also try to suggest our memory is not fixed or sealed but a growing, fluid thing. I try to create imagery that evokes emotions (and maybe a tad of nostalgia, as well).\u201d<\/p>\n

We think he has succeeded magnificently. We hope you agree.<\/p>\n

Susan Bell
\nEditor-in-Chief
\nUSC Dornsife Magazine<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
(Composite by Letty Avila; Marcel Proust painting by Jacques Emile-Blanche.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n <\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cover-story"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nCover Story Fall '20 - Winter '21<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Cover Story Fall '20 - Winter '21 - USC Dornsife Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"USC Dornsife Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-07-08T18:20:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-05-19T21:28:43+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Michael Liu\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Michael Liu\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/#\/schema\/person\/d03084ed5319ed7575c96017879a7447\"},\"headline\":\"Cover Story Fall ’20 – Winter ’21\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-07-08T18:20:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-05-19T21:28:43+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021\/\"},\"wordCount\":5,\"commentCount\":0,\"articleSection\":[\"Cover Story\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/magazine\/cover-story-fall-2020-winter-2021\/\",\"name\":\"Cover Story Fall '20 - 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