Structure

You Could Make This Place Beautiful is divided into one page fragments. The author gives each of these fragments titles like, “The Material”, “A Friend Says Every Book Begins with an Unanswerable Question”, “This is Where I Completely Freaked Out”, and “A Pantoum, A Villanelle, A Ghazal”. Throughout the memoir, Smith explores her life through a third person point of view in the fragments entitled, “The Play”. As the text progresses, she revisits how her life, her marriage, and her role as a mother would look onstage. Similarly, “On Second Thought” is a recurring fragment in which Smith retracts her previous assertions, revisits her initial thoughts, and discusses new perspectives. While the anecdotal structure of the text creates a staccato pacing, her use of repeating titles creates a narrative continuity for the reader.

Throughout the text, fragments entitled “A Friend Says Every Book Begins with an Unanswerable...