David Sedaris: 97% True + 3% Fake = Non-Fiction ↪
pile:
Has anyone noticed how much people are talking about the definition of fiction these days? They are done getting upset at non-fiction being fiction and have started getting worried about fiction really being exaggerated non-fiction. But I don’t get why they are so up in arms––It’s always been like that. Hemingway had one love story and he wrote it over and over because it was what happened to him and he couldn’t get over it. Fitzgerald, too.
I think the problem is we just know way more about writer’s personal lives now so this bothers us, maybe takes some of the magic out of it. But I don’t think it should. Fiction is supposed to make sense of reality, find some beauty or lesson in it when life is to complicated to figure out on your own. It’s never just made up. It’s always non-fiction to some extent. Isn’t that why people read it?
Come on people! Next to Chuck Klosterman David writes some of the best books I’ve ever read.