10 years later, Eric Chason releases memoir to remember daughter Lillian

Ten years after the death of former UNC student, Lillian Chason, her father, Eric Chason, has released a memoir called "Breathless," keeping her memory alive. 

Eric Chason will be visiting Flyleaf Books on Wednesday, Jan. 29, to have a conversation about Lillian with UNC assistant professor Mark Perry and read from his book. 

The memoir was written primarily while Lillian was in the hospital, and remained on his desk for many years before he decided to publish it, Eric Chason said. 

“It’s been 10 years,” Eric Chason said. “When we were in the hospital, I kept a journal, and I wanted to remember what happened. I was hoping at the time to tell Lil the story when she got better.”

The memoir is written as a fragmented narrative, with some chapters taking place in the hospital and others taking place in Lillian’s youth, Eric Chason said. 

“There are two stories that sort of happen in parallel,” Eric Chason said. “So, one is that she was in the hospital for 28 days, so that’s the way it started with just writing down all the things that happened in those 28 days. Then, I interspersed it with other vignettes from her life leading up to that time.” 

Eric Chason chose to use a fragmented narrative because he did not want to solely highlight Lillian’s illness. Instead he wanted to tell a story about her independence and the other struggles she was facing.

This included Stargardt disease, to which she was genetically predisposed and caused her to slowly lose her eyesight.

“There’s sort of the other arch of the story, from the time she found out she was losing her eyesight to Carolina," Eric Chason said. "You know, it was really quite a challenge, and really quite an amazing thing — a triumph — to get there.” 

The memoir was published by Perry, who met Lillian after he wrote “A New Dress for Mona,” the production she was meant to star in the year of her death. 

“It’s really lovely the way that the flashbacks teach you about Lillian — about their relationship — and in a way creates some sense of her as an actor,” Perry said. “You know, there she is in the hospital, and she’s just there unable to communicate, but you really get to meet the person and the fire behind the person."

Although Lillian was losing her eyesight, she did not let it deter her, but instead it encouraged her to pursue her dreams at UNC, said Leslie Kreizman, a family friend and UNC computer support specialist. 

“For the times that I was with her and went out to lunch with her, I would say she was just a joyous person,” Kreizman said. “Obviously, she had the hurdles that she was going to have to overcome as time went by with her eyesight, but you could tell that that was not going to stop her.” 

When Lillian entered the hospital with H1N1 in the fall of 2009, while Eric Chason was writing his memoir, his wife, Cate Chason, was also composing poetry and posting it on Facebook to detail her time in the hospital.

“Facebook was a way to broadcast to let people know about it without having to talk to a lot of individuals,” Eric Chason said. “I would go back to the Ronald McDonald House to read what she had posted during the day, and I remember coming back in the evening and she had just posted one poem, a really beautiful poem, about Lil, and I was just floored. I guess she just felt like she had to express some of her feelings and it came out in poetry.” 

Cate Chason’s poems, which are titled “Poems for Medical Students,” were published individually as well, but when Eric Chason was publishing his memoir, some of her poems were included in his book to complement his experience, Perry said. 

“They are a different angle on that experience,” Perry said. “She’s not a scientist, she’s an artist, and so her take on that experience was very different and complementary.” 

Eric Chason will be doing his first North Carolina reading of the memoir at Flyleaf Books. Although this is his first book as a non-academic writer, Flyleaf Books was happy to have him due to the relevance of the story in the local community, said events manager Talia Smart. 

“I think that it can be kind of risky to host an event for somebody who’s a debut author or are debuting a certain style,” Smart said. “But, in this case, Eric Chason and his daughter Lillian’s story is so relevant to the community and to Chapel Hill, everything that went down happened here and at UNC, so I just think there will be people in the community who remember this happening and want to learn more.” 

Kreizman said although many students have died during their time at UNC, the Chasons have stayed connected with the University and have turned Lillian’s story into something positive and beneficial for other students.

“I think Eric and Cate could have, during the settlement, chosen to say, ‘You know what, UNC completely messed up and I just want to take what I can from them and never set foot on campus again,’” Kreizman said. “In turn, they have taken this horrific situation and turned it around to be something very positive for current and future students between the scholarships and the plays; they’re pretty special people.” 

@Sarah_campbs 

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