Intentionally or not, most writers inevitably create a persona that the reader feels they know. In general, when we read, we experience the force of the intelligence or personality behind the text, and that personality -- whether it's near or far to that of the real person -- becomes a character in the larger narratives we construct about our own experience. It's natural, then, that people want to flesh out and understand that persona. Finding evidence in a writer's life that expands our understanding of that persona is interesting, but, just as in fiction, conflict is more interesting -- and so when we find evidence in a person's life of choices or events that contradict the persona we encounter in the fiction, it creates a tension between our two experiences of the author (within and without the text), and that makes for more compelling narrative.
Many readers are happy to stop at the text. But just as many more feel the presence of the individual mind behind the text, and want, or even need, to know more. All the biographies of Shakespeare show how far we'll go, driven by this desire or need, to build houses out of the flimiest of materials. I think that's inevitable whenever an author writes so compellingly as to move us or affect our lives.
Intentionally or not, most writers inevitably create a persona that the reader feels they know. In general, when we read, we experience the force of the intelligence or personality behind the text, and that personality -- whether it's near or far to that of the real person -- becomes a character in the larger narratives we construct about our own experience. It's natural, then, that people want to flesh out and understand that persona. Finding evidence in a writer's life that expands our understanding of that persona is interesting, but, just as in fiction, conflict is more interesting -- and so when we find evidence in a person's life of choices or events that contradict the persona we encounter in the fiction, it creates a tension between our two experiences of the author (within and without the text), and that makes for more compelling narrative.
Oh, I agree. And in my own footnote at the bottom of the catchall chapter of Millstones of Mediocrity: Forgotten Authors of the Late 20th Century no doubt some desperate grad student might dig up an old school mate who will attest to the fact that I used to pretend to be an alien, or from England, or time-traveled out of history, at the playground.
Writers test-drive characters in various ways, including on themselves.
My question is, do writerw owe the public (journalists, whatever) all the true facts? I don't believe so.
No, of course, writers don't owe readers the facts of their lives.
But the desire to know them means that the more facts that are concealed, the more interesting it is, and the more compelling a narrative it makes. Writers don't, and can't, control the publicly-constructed narratives of their lives by witholding facts, even if that's the impulse that drives it.
Intentionally or not, most writers inevitably create a persona that the reader feels they know. In general, when we read, we experience the force of the intelligence or personality behind the text, and that personality -- whether it's near or far to that of the real person -- becomes a character in the larger narratives we construct about our own experience. It's natural, then, that people want to flesh out and understand that persona. Finding evidence in a writer's life that expands our understanding of that persona is interesting, but, just as in fiction, conflict is more interesting -- and so when we find evidence in a person's life of choices or events that contradict the persona we encounter in the fiction, it creates a tension between our two experiences of the author (within and without the text), and that makes for more compelling narrative.
Many readers are happy to stop at the text. But just as many more feel the presence of the individual mind behind the text, and want, or even need, to know more. All the biographies of Shakespeare show how far we'll go, driven by this desire or need, to build houses out of the flimiest of materials. I think that's inevitable whenever an author writes so compellingly as to move us or affect our lives.
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Oh, I agree. And in my own footnote at the bottom of the catchall chapter of Millstones of Mediocrity: Forgotten Authors of the Late 20th Century no doubt some desperate grad student might dig up an old school mate who will attest to the fact that I used to pretend to be an alien, or from England, or time-traveled out of history, at the playground.
Writers test-drive characters in various ways, including on themselves.
My question is, do writerw owe the public (journalists, whatever) all the true facts? I don't believe so.
Reply
But the desire to know them means that the more facts that are concealed, the more interesting it is, and the more compelling a narrative it makes. Writers don't, and can't, control the publicly-constructed narratives of their lives by witholding facts, even if that's the impulse that drives it.
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