Truth, Fact and Fiction
I like to say writers are no different than anybody else. This, even though I know it's not exactly true. We have the same basic human failings, wants and needs as the rest of humanity. Still, we are different, in subtle little ways...and in not so subtle ways. Eavesdropping. Is one of those subtle ways. Yes, writers listen to every conversation going on around them. Listen to the cadence of their words. Why did he choose those particular words? Did they just tumble out of his mouth or had he thought them through. Why did she respond like that?
A writer has mapped out an entire life for the participants of an overheard conversation well before it ends. How accurate are the writer’s assessments. That’s not important. Only that someday a shred of the conversation may appear in his/her writing.
The monster that lives in every writer’s mind has an incessant need to write-write-write and write some more. And nothing is sacred. Everything that transpires in a writer's life is fodder for that need. The friend whose husband left her for a woman with a silicone enhanced chest, she just appeared in this sentence. See what I mean? The food server who brought yesterday’s pancakes with a cheery “Short stacks all around.” You know the one. The one with the tired face and feet; she’s in the waiting area of the writer’s imagination.
So, you ask. What about the non-fiction writer? Aren’t they adherents to the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Yes and no. Here is where the difference between truth and facts comes in. Let’s look at the aforementioned food server counting her tips at the end of a grueling shift. Separating fact from fiction and truth: truth is, the IRS (bless their little hearts,) has determined what tips said food server will make in relation to pancakes served. And truth is, she has made that $17.77. So she will dutifully write that down $17.77 knowing that she will pay tax on that amount as well. That’s a fact, folks. But so is the fact that the food server actually raked in the princely sum of $27 dollars and 85 cents for eight hours’ worth of short stacks all around. Is it fiction to write that she informed the IRS of that extra ten dollars? Or has she learned something from those billionaires and their offshore tax shelters? Ten dollars isn’t squat to them—will she keep quiet, laughing all the way to Wal-Mart with her extra ten to spend? Or will she write down $27.55, in essence telling the IRS that they don’t know a stack of pancakes from a stack of sh--? It’s not the food server’s problem. She’s bought herself a new lipstick, a bottle of wine and heading for her car. But it is the writer’s dilemma. Truth, fact and fiction add a couple of eggs and it might make a very good omelet
A writer has mapped out an entire life for the participants of an overheard conversation well before it ends. How accurate are the writer’s assessments. That’s not important. Only that someday a shred of the conversation may appear in his/her writing.
The monster that lives in every writer’s mind has an incessant need to write-write-write and write some more. And nothing is sacred. Everything that transpires in a writer's life is fodder for that need. The friend whose husband left her for a woman with a silicone enhanced chest, she just appeared in this sentence. See what I mean? The food server who brought yesterday’s pancakes with a cheery “Short stacks all around.” You know the one. The one with the tired face and feet; she’s in the waiting area of the writer’s imagination.
So, you ask. What about the non-fiction writer? Aren’t they adherents to the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Yes and no. Here is where the difference between truth and facts comes in. Let’s look at the aforementioned food server counting her tips at the end of a grueling shift. Separating fact from fiction and truth: truth is, the IRS (bless their little hearts,) has determined what tips said food server will make in relation to pancakes served. And truth is, she has made that $17.77. So she will dutifully write that down $17.77 knowing that she will pay tax on that amount as well. That’s a fact, folks. But so is the fact that the food server actually raked in the princely sum of $27 dollars and 85 cents for eight hours’ worth of short stacks all around. Is it fiction to write that she informed the IRS of that extra ten dollars? Or has she learned something from those billionaires and their offshore tax shelters? Ten dollars isn’t squat to them—will she keep quiet, laughing all the way to Wal-Mart with her extra ten to spend? Or will she write down $27.55, in essence telling the IRS that they don’t know a stack of pancakes from a stack of sh--? It’s not the food server’s problem. She’s bought herself a new lipstick, a bottle of wine and heading for her car. But it is the writer’s dilemma. Truth, fact and fiction add a couple of eggs and it might make a very good omelet
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