Liars Like Authors

Some wonder that if a man says something in the middle of a forest where no woman can hear him, is he still wrong? Stemming off this famous philosophical inquiry, I wonder whether or not a liar is still lying if they are never figured out. Now, I’m not talking about liars who tell petty white lies about finishing homework or getting ready in 5 minutes. I’m talking about liars like fiction narrative authors. I’m talking about liars who generate entire cohesive and self-consistent worlds to mask every aspect of the situation: a perfect, unbreakable lie. If you think about it, authors are professional liars. Their job is to create a world to be as believable as possible by making it self-consistent. Simultaneously, the essence of good lie is self-consistency.

Now, assuming this massive scale lie doesn’t impact anyone’s life drastically, does this liar deserve the infamy that a liar in society gets? Say you’re at a party, and you’ve just become acquainted with a man who proceeds to tell you the completely falsified story of his life. He tells entertaining stories of his longest chesthair world record and walking in on a couple having sex on a bed in Bed, Bath & Beyond. He covers every loophole, and has the confidence of a middle schooler who just landed his first kiss. His tales can technically be true, but are so farfetched that you begin to question their reality. You’re never going to see this man again, so it doesn’t really matter whether or not he’s telling the truth, but would you still give this man the respect of an honest man? Would you still label him as a liar?