“It is impossible to separate nature and nurture. You cannot isolate a person from the world in which he lives, but more than that, notions of outside and inside, subject and object become entwined.” (P 69 Hustvedt)

“The faculty of memory cannot be separated from the imagination, they go hand in hand. To one degree or another, we all invent our personal past. And for most of  us those pasts are built from emotionally colored memories”  (p 83 Hustvedt)

The idea expressed by Hustvedt is in direct correlation to Eakin’s idea that autobiography has an innately fictional element. When the according to Demasio’s 3 levels of consciousness the most malleable ‘self’ is the autobiographical self. Hustvedt notes the ambiguity present in our lingual and mental narratives the same question asked by Eakin. Can a story ever be wholly true when narratives stem from the autobiographical self. An aspect of consciousness that is constantly being revised with the advent of new stimuli with new realities, past influences, various environmental changes. “Freud wrote that the present colors the past, the memories are not always what they seem and cannot be relied upon as factual…Most crucially, people revise their memories at a later date.”  (P81 Hustvedt)

The main idea of a proto or primal self to a mammalian both preexist language. These authors use similar methods and  multiple sources to answer a question, which leads to the author’s motives. Both, Eakin and Hustvedt used elements from neurosciences; DeMasio, Self as a result of brain structure and the theory of self” beneath language” as developed by Demasio (P67   Eakin) Psychology; Freud  and their own experiences  to find an answer to their question or their motive.

The idea of ownership is prevalent in both pieces, the idea of I, me and mine. A link to the outer and inner world and the understandings between them.