Eireann Corrigan Quotes

“…we’ll both claim we want to die. But we’ll mean: Please someone convince us to stick around… Because last night, we stood on top of fourteen floors of suffering—from the maternity to the morgue. Hundreds of bed buckling beneath the weight of legitimate illness, thousands of plastic sacks of donated blood—we stood above all of it and did not leap” (38). The meaningful words of Eireann Corrigan speak volumes about her past experience growing up with an eating disorder. In her memoir she highlights many ideas of how she felt through not only her experiences, but also those of her boyfriend, Danny. The various poetic devices present within the story come together to create a deep and meaningful novel. Eireann Corrigan, author of the memoir, You

Remind Me of You, recreates the powerful and memorable narrative of her past using various poetic devices such as similes, personification, and allusion.
Corrigan’s use of poetic devices, particularly similes, add more meaning to the novel in that they emphasize the author’s emotions through comparison.

For instance, the novel reads, “… my right arm prickles and then numbs and my chest all of a sudden feels like it’s splintering, like inside some man is throwing his shoulder against a door again and again” (21). Corrigan’s anorexia often comes with dangerous consequences. It is evident in this excerpt that she is in a state of pain as she compares how she feels to being hit again and again by a man seemingly inside her. Although the reader is not able to experience her physical pain, they are able to understand to some extent the pain in which she is feeling. Poetic devices allow readers to recognize a character’s emotions by comparing it to a different circumstance. Likewise, the author wrote, “… I spread the local paper out on my kitchen table, looking for the movie listings and a slim column on the front page rose up: North Brunswick Man Shot and I only stopped to read it because that’s where you lived—in the sprawling neighborhood as secure and tended as a tiny national park…” (56). Corrigan’s old boyfriend, Danny, was known to be suicidal and one night decided to shoot himself in the head with a handgun. The bullet entered his head and ricocheted off his skull, narrowly missing his brain. For Corrigan, discovering this in her local paper came as quite a shock to her and she wondered how such an event could happen in a

neighborhood that seemed so quiet and protected. Her comparison of Danny’s neighborhood to a national park describes how unlikely, and therefore significant, an incident such as this could have occurred. The usage of a simile accentuates Corrigan’s surprise and her reaction to Danny’s suicide attempt. Furthermore, Corrigan stated, “All of our mistakes- innumerable as stars” (120). In this quote from the novel, Corrigan compares her mistakes with her boyfriend, Danny, to the stars with the idea that there were too many to count. This comparison emphasizes the point the author is attempting to make that their relationship was far from perfect, but they still fought to keep together for as long as they could despite the innumerable problems they might have had. The author made an effort to convince readers of one of her central ideas that love was something that took a significant amount of effort, loyalty, and patience which in turn created an influential novel with a deeper meaning behind every use of poetic devices. The use of similes in Corrigan’s writing produced a meaningful memoir with deep, rich emotions of the characters.
The author uses the poetic device of personification in her writing as a powerful tool that through giving objects human characteristics provides insight into the feelings of her characters.
To illustrate, Corrigan wrote, “If you are gaining weight at the acceptable pace, (which is two and a half to three pounds a week) …you’ve graduated from tubes and have no clumsy IV to dance alongside you…“ (37). Due to Corrigan’s worsening eating disorder during the latter part of her high school years, she was admitted into a hospital to recover. The first few weeks she was fed by an IV until she had gained an adequate amount of weight. She described the machine as having danced beside her in order to explain how difficult and annoying it was to have to be attached to a piece of equipment, thus emphasizing the joy she felt when she no longer had that burden. The use of personification in this instance helped to describe her feelings toward the machine. Similarly, she also stated, “I’ve gained eighteen pounds in the past two months and the small refrigerator already sits in the car’s trunk, smugly” (83). After spending some time in the hospital, she prepared to leave for college. She gave her refrigerator human emotions by saying that it sat in her trunk with a smug expression. The fact that Corrigan seemed almost intimidated by her refrigerator or rather the simple act of eating in itself, indicates that she had still not fully recovered from her eating disorder despite her release from the hospital. The use of personification described her apprehension toward being expected to eat properly on her own at college. Further, the text reads, “I know that in your head stretches a world paved with ways to die, methods hunched over in the shadows, ready to leap into the light at the slightest misstep” (101). In reference to Corrigan’s boyfriend, Danny, she provided insight into how she imagined Danny thought about death. She personified these abstract ideas of ways to die by describing them as if they were human. Her use of personification displayed how Corrigan thought of Danny’s feelings toward death. Personification is useful in understanding how the author is explaining a topic, in this case being the feelings of Corrigan’s characters.
Corrigan used allusion to emphasize the main ideas she was conveying to the reader while also enhancing and deepening the meaning of her writing.

For example, Corrigan said, “Sometimes he claimed the scar along his thigh indicated he was actually the biblical figure of Jacob. Jacob, the brother of Esau? Jacob, who wrestled God’s angel and lived” (80). Corrigan, in this excerpt from the novel, alluded to the bible story in Genesis. One who knows the story of Jacob and Esau would be able to make connections between those from that story and the characters in the book. This biblical allusion caused some readers to be able to make deeper connections in the novel but yet does not hinder the understanding of someone who does not recognize the reference. Corrigan also wrote, “You so easily remember the times I was Eurydice, when the ward’s locked door slid closed between us. Do not forget I also have been Orpheus, on my knees in the boat, asking all the devils for your face in the trees” (100). This allusion to Greek mythology aided the reader in understanding one of Corrigan’s central themes in her novel. In the story Orpheus was a poet who was able to entrance enemies with his singing and lyre playing. After his wife, Eurydice, was killed, he traveled to the underworld to rescue her. Corrigan writes that she and Danny took turns being both Eurydice and Orpheus in that one was doing the rescuing and one was being rescued. They were there for each other through their troubles and

motivated each other to continue fighting. This allusion explains to readers one of the main themes present in the novel and the comparisons between the two stories makes Corrigan’s writing more meaningful. Examples of allusion help readers understand an author’s theme and deepens the writing’s meaning.
In summation, poetic devices such as similes, personification, and allusion can create a powerfully written novel such as in Eireann Corrigan’s memoir, You Remind Me of You. The language and style techniques brought Corrigan’s writing together to form a touching piece about a girl overcoming anorexia with the help of a suicidal boyfriend. The memoir taught that sometimes someone just needs someone to live for.