Fiction
I love words. I’m infinitely fascinated by the way we can use words to create, build, and inspire but also destroy, tear down, and instill fear. Of equal importance are the relationships between words (and the ideas they represent). Some words have an almost supernatural affinity for each other, while others seem destined to be rivals and opposites forever.
One of my favorite of these relationships is between the words “fiction” and “truth.”
Often these two words are cast as rivals, opposites, even enemies of each other; as mutually exclusive. Fiction is fabricated, made up, the stuff of imagination. A hobby or leisure activity designed to be entertaining. Whereas “truth” is all about “real” things, concrete facts, data, and objective reality.
This opposition seems quite natural, but each of these words has relationships with other words that in turn shape our understanding of them. Truth is closely related to science, and thus to something essential to the very fabric of reality. Truth is also often linked to “fact,”“history,” and “objectivity.” History in turn is the opposite of “myth” which is a particular kind of fiction.
A key connection that is often overlooked is between truth and “meaning.” Meaning making is an inherently interpretative task. It considers facts that are provable, as well as more subjective variables, and organizes them into a generally coherent pattern.
Fiction, even the most fantastic and whimsical fiction, participates in the ongoing meaning making project we as human beings are constantly engaging in. Fiction provides us with imaginative scaffolding we can put up around our objective (historically verifiable) and subjective (feelings and perceptions) experiences as we craft them into a cohesive whole.
Far from being the opposite of history, myth is the integration of history and its perception into a narrative that creates meaning on a societal or cultural level. History tells us how something came to be, myth tells us why it matters. In this sense recognizing how our perceptions are shaped by fiction enables us to see ourselves more honestly, and ironically, live more authentically in a non-fictional world.
The ability to give expression to parts of ourselves we otherwise ignore or are simply ignorant of is an increasingly critical one in our personal and social lives. Empathy and self-awareness are key exports of the fiction we read. Being drawn into the lives of characters in situations and contexts and relationships vastly different than our own gives us room for evaluating our own situations and contexts and relationships. The emotional logic driving a character’s course of action may be rationally non-sensical to us and yet “feel” right at the same time, even as we reel in shock or horror as the action plays out.
This point of incongruity is a location for personal growth. It acknowledges the validity of a course of action different than one we might take, even if only in the mind of someone else. People are complicated. People are pulled in a thousand directions by forces and memories and obligations unknown to outside observers.
This is why I love the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan. The fifteen book series has an enormous cast of characters but centers around three young men and their struggles with destiny. Over time each character takes on a completely believable emotional life of their own in which whole arcs of the series are driven by the memories of seemingly momentary past interactions.
None of the Wheel of Time is historically verifiable. It is a completely fictional world. But there is something true about it, because after reading it I walk away more truly human.
