Elisa Gabbert

Elisa Gabbert is the author of all 13 essays collected in The Unreality of Memory. Gabbert is a writer, a columnist, and a poet, and has written numerous essay collections. In The Unreality of Memory, Gabbert is specifically considering the ways in which human populations have orchestrated, been victimized by, or responded to large scale disasters throughout time. In “Magnificent Desolation,” Gabbert admits that watching the Titanic simulation gave her “an overwhelming desire for disaster stories, of a particular flavor: I wanted stories about great technological feats meeting their untimely doom. I felt addicted to disbelief” (5). These lines illuminate many of Gabbert’s examinations and explorations in the essays following. However, in the collection’s final piece, “Epilogue: The Unreality of Time,” Gabbert appears less certain about what it is she has been seeking in her research and writing. When her mother asserts that Gabbert’s book...