Beyond Memory and Words: Exploring Identity in They Made A List by Susan Letzler Cole

By SAFIYA MOHAMED

SDSU Press

They Made A List: A Memoir Beyond Memory by Susan Letzler Cole is a beautifully reflective journey through early language, memory, and the quiet power of parental attention. Rather than following a linear narrative, Cole’s memoir unfolds as a series of intimate meditations—lenses through which we glimpse not only a child’s early development but the enduring mystery of self-discovery. 

At the heart of the book is a lovingly compiled list of the author's first 200 words, meticulously recorded by her parents during the first ten and a half months of her life. Years after their passing, Cole uncovered these lists and embarked on a deeply personal quest: to discover which word came first. That search led her to profound questions—about identity, memory, and the very act of noticing.

"Why do I care about this list of my earliest words?" Cole asks. "Am I looking for myself? Am I looking for my parents, long dead, whom I might resurrect by these words? If I could peer into my first words, or the spaces between them, what would I know about my life? Do I learn that we shall never know enough about who we are, and why?"

They Made A List offers readers more than just a nostalgic look at babyhood. With baby snapshots, health records, parental notes, and tender reflections, it becomes a meditation on how we trace the threads of who we are—through language, love, and the fragments our caregivers leave behind.

Susan Letzler Cole is a professor of English and director of the Concentrations in Creative Writing and Dramatic Studies at Albertus Magnus College. She is also the author of several acclaimed works, including The Absent One, Directors in Rehearsal, Playwrights in Rehearsal, and Missing Alice: In Search of a Mother’s Voice. 

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ISBN-10 : 193853719X

ISBN-13 : 978-1938537196