Truth in Writing
Jan. 27th, 2006 12:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
starzkiI can't help but be thinking about this since it's on the cover of both of my city's newspapers this morning: Was there any harm done by James Frey's "lies" in A Million Little Pieces?
I'm going to give my opinion and say no.
I also have to say that honesty is one of the most important things in the world to me and I feel that it is a huge sign of disrespect to lie to someone. However, I think that this view is limited to interpersonal contact between people who know each other more than superficially. Once you start analyzing "truth" in what is written, especially in what is written for an audience that the author will likely never wholly meet, things become murky.
I read A Million Little Pieces in late November after Frey was on Oprah. I didn't read it because it was Oprah's choice, but after hearing about it and picking it up and thumbing through it, I thought it looked like an interesting read. And it was. I liked the book. I liked it's structure and general mood. I don't know if this is just me thinking I'm Miss Smartypants after the fact, but I don't think I totally believed everything in the book even as he was saying that he had all the records in front of him. It was just too dramatic in a way that's more "movie dramatic" than "real life dramatic." Also, in a lot of places, it looked to me like he was just a guy trying really hard to write his experiences in a way that would make him seem cool. Nobody's that cool. Drug addicts, especially, are not cool. All that being said, I liked the book a lot.
I think there was an honesty in A Million Little Pieces that, perhaps, the "true" facts couldn't portray.
Now let me see if I can explain the above statement. I think my philosophy about truth in writing is heavily influenced by Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried. It's an awesome book about the Vietnam War. O'Brien actually came to my tiny undergrad university and spoke to my lit class and was able to talk about his purpose for writing it in a little more detail than was in the book. So my thoughts on this come both from his talk and from the book. In The Things They Carried, O'Brien really plays with his readers in the nature of truth. He'll avow that a particular story is true, but then go on to say that it didn't actually happen. He said that the truth is more of a lie if it doesn't make the reader actually feel what he was feeling during his own experiences in Vietnam. So he'll make up a story that will make the reader see the horror or humor or boredom or whatever else he was feeling during that time. He's, in effect, lying to tell a better truth. If an author writes what actually happened and it doesn't strike the reader in a way that they can really empathize with or fully understand, isn't that a lie, then, too? O'Brien said that a lot of people he meets who have read his book have major problems with his "lying" and think that if they hear what actually happen, they'll understand it just fine.
I don't think I'm making my point. I'll illustrate using a story from the book. In The Things They Carried, there is a very disturbing scene of a couple of soldiers who basically torture to death a baby water buffalo. It was hard to read. But I think O'Brien wanted to show how being soldiers in Vietnam, by dying and killing in an environment so far from home, changed these boys and made many of them more inhumane. The discomfort and horror of what it must have felt like to see "normal" boys become so jaded and de-sensitized to violence came through loud and clear. Personally, I don't think I could have understood it nearly as well (or even really remembered it like I do that terrible scene) if O'Brien had said something more "factual" (which probably would have been seeing the change in the way the soldiers talked to and acted towards each other and the Vietnamese).
Now, I'm going to translate O'Brien's flexibility with the truth to Frey's. His book has helped people (I saw it Oprah, so it must be true). He told a truth that some addicts can relate to and recognize within themselves that make them want to get help. Again, the book is good. Lying about the fact that the entire book is composed of nothing but hard facts makes Frey an asshole, but not a bad writer. The time I spent reading the book was time well-spent. I don't feel betrayed. There was nothing in me that needed anything in the book to be factual because I do think that there is a kind of honesty in the book. All I'm saying is that maybe it was more honest (maybe more deeply honest?) with the factual inaccuracies in the way it made me feel what he was feeling at the time.
Writers aren't necessarily reporters. They tell a different kind of truth.
I'm going to give my opinion and say no.
I also have to say that honesty is one of the most important things in the world to me and I feel that it is a huge sign of disrespect to lie to someone. However, I think that this view is limited to interpersonal contact between people who know each other more than superficially. Once you start analyzing "truth" in what is written, especially in what is written for an audience that the author will likely never wholly meet, things become murky.
I read A Million Little Pieces in late November after Frey was on Oprah. I didn't read it because it was Oprah's choice, but after hearing about it and picking it up and thumbing through it, I thought it looked like an interesting read. And it was. I liked the book. I liked it's structure and general mood. I don't know if this is just me thinking I'm Miss Smartypants after the fact, but I don't think I totally believed everything in the book even as he was saying that he had all the records in front of him. It was just too dramatic in a way that's more "movie dramatic" than "real life dramatic." Also, in a lot of places, it looked to me like he was just a guy trying really hard to write his experiences in a way that would make him seem cool. Nobody's that cool. Drug addicts, especially, are not cool. All that being said, I liked the book a lot.
I think there was an honesty in A Million Little Pieces that, perhaps, the "true" facts couldn't portray.
Now let me see if I can explain the above statement. I think my philosophy about truth in writing is heavily influenced by Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried. It's an awesome book about the Vietnam War. O'Brien actually came to my tiny undergrad university and spoke to my lit class and was able to talk about his purpose for writing it in a little more detail than was in the book. So my thoughts on this come both from his talk and from the book. In The Things They Carried, O'Brien really plays with his readers in the nature of truth. He'll avow that a particular story is true, but then go on to say that it didn't actually happen. He said that the truth is more of a lie if it doesn't make the reader actually feel what he was feeling during his own experiences in Vietnam. So he'll make up a story that will make the reader see the horror or humor or boredom or whatever else he was feeling during that time. He's, in effect, lying to tell a better truth. If an author writes what actually happened and it doesn't strike the reader in a way that they can really empathize with or fully understand, isn't that a lie, then, too? O'Brien said that a lot of people he meets who have read his book have major problems with his "lying" and think that if they hear what actually happen, they'll understand it just fine.
I don't think I'm making my point. I'll illustrate using a story from the book. In The Things They Carried, there is a very disturbing scene of a couple of soldiers who basically torture to death a baby water buffalo. It was hard to read. But I think O'Brien wanted to show how being soldiers in Vietnam, by dying and killing in an environment so far from home, changed these boys and made many of them more inhumane. The discomfort and horror of what it must have felt like to see "normal" boys become so jaded and de-sensitized to violence came through loud and clear. Personally, I don't think I could have understood it nearly as well (or even really remembered it like I do that terrible scene) if O'Brien had said something more "factual" (which probably would have been seeing the change in the way the soldiers talked to and acted towards each other and the Vietnamese).
Now, I'm going to translate O'Brien's flexibility with the truth to Frey's. His book has helped people (I saw it Oprah, so it must be true). He told a truth that some addicts can relate to and recognize within themselves that make them want to get help. Again, the book is good. Lying about the fact that the entire book is composed of nothing but hard facts makes Frey an asshole, but not a bad writer. The time I spent reading the book was time well-spent. I don't feel betrayed. There was nothing in me that needed anything in the book to be factual because I do think that there is a kind of honesty in the book. All I'm saying is that maybe it was more honest (maybe more deeply honest?) with the factual inaccuracies in the way it made me feel what he was feeling at the time.
Writers aren't necessarily reporters. They tell a different kind of truth.
