Ramblings and One-Offs: The Reality of a Fictional Creation

I have always viewed writing as an act of creation. With fiction, in particular, an author breaths life into his or her characters. He or she crafts a world for those characters to inhabit. With words alone, a universe comes into being and we, as readers, can witness the reality of a fictional creation. This analogy is pretty common and not particularly profound, in and of its self. Many authors allude to this point of view and some are rather explicit about it. Leslie Marmon Silko begins the novel, "Ceremony" thusly: "Ts'its'tsi'nako, Thought-Woman, / is sitting in her room / and whatever she thinks about / appears" (Silko 1). This poem frames the act of literary creation (thinking things into existence) with literal divine creation (the things actually appear). I believe that, as Silko's poem suggests, the realness of fiction should be taken far more literally. I say this because these fake things and real things exist in the same once form once they are within the mind and because these fake things can, indeed, affect our own world.

What is reality as we experience it? Things exist around us and stimulate our senses. Our senses transmit their data to our mind and our mind puts the pieces together. What is fiction as we experience it? We read, or see, or hear something that doesn't exist, our senses are bypassed (mostly), and our mind puts the pieces together. The end result is the same. Our perception of reality is an interpretation of data, just as our perception of fiction is an interpretation of data. When viewed from this perspective, reality and fiction become equally real (in our heads, at least). They both impact the mind and cause a reaction, they both create memories, and they can both shape who we are. The only distinction is that the two realities are made of different things. Specifically, the reality that we all live in composed of matter and the fictional reality is made of words, thoughts, and pictures.

One may argue that real reality more real than fictional reality because things within it can have agency. I, on the other hand, would say that fictional things have an agency of their own. A fictional character may not be able to grasp an object, you may may not be able to be touched by him, but he may still affect the world. His words can incite feeling in a reader, those feeling may lead to an action, and that action may change things in the real reality. In this sense, our fictional creations are as real as you or I.

What does all of this mean for readers and writers? After all, writers will write whether we classify fiction as real or fake and the fiction will keep on being what it is and doing what it does. There are, however, some real benefits for both readers and writers who adopt this point of view. To a reader, this idea changes how he or she responds to things. The pain he or she feels when his or her favorite character is killed is immensely magnified, his or her joy is overwhelming when delightful events transpire, and so on. In short, a reader greatly increases the power and potential enjoyability of all the fiction that he or she consumes. For a writer, approaching a narrative with a belief in reality of fiction can add another layer, thought, planning, and intention to their work. As a result extra layer, the writer's work will be deeper, more polished, and more pleasurable to read.

Peace.

I am considering making this a new (but less frequent) series similar to my Philosophy of Use and Drug War Stupidity posts. Drugs, the drug war, cannabis, and psychedelics will remain the primary focus of my blog (because I truly love those topics) but I hope to create an outlet that allows me to write about the other nonsense that cross my mind but doesn't fit into my other series. If you found this to be uninteresting, fear not I will be back to creating my normal content shortly. However, if you liked this, let me know and I will write more of these Ramblings and One-Offs every so often.

The novel from which I quoted is the Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition of Leslie Marmon Silko's "Ceremony." I would certainly recommend it to anyone who likes a mildly trippy but extremely moving and very intense literary experience.

Unless otherwise credited, all the images in this post are sourced from the free image website unsplash.com.