What is Fiction For?
“Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another’s skin, another’s voice, another’s soul.” Joyce Carol Oates
I think it’s obvious that a post on this question can only ever scratch the surface. So here goes!
First, consider the experience of reading fiction. What does it feel like? What is happening in our minds?
When we are reading a good novel we know what is supposed to happen - we get lost in the story, caught up in the fictive dream, we suspend our disbelief - at least until the writer makes some kind of mistake which jolts us rudely back into reality.
We know less about what that feels like for individual readers - who may have very individual versions of this experience. Some have talked about seeing the characters and events in their mind’s eye, as if watching a film. Others may have a less visual experience, and may simply hear themselves relating a story, perhaps as if it’s a verbal memory. Some identify strongly with the characters - at least the fully rounded ones, or a first person narrator. Some are watching from the outside.
For all of us it is an active process. The writer and the reader are really collaborators in producing the story. The work of the fiction writer is to give us enough detailed sensory and emotional information to make the story come alive for us - but we see our own imaginary version of the characters, and we work to fill in the gaps to make the story more real. This goes some way to explaining why many of us prefer the book to the TV series or film - it can be quite disappointing when the screen version doesn’t match up to the one in our imagination.
Of course, we do that with reality too - we just tend not to think about it too much! Reality may stay the same - but each individual’s perception of it is different, and partial based on our own individual experiences.
“People think that stories are shaped by people. In fact, it's the other way around.”
Terry Pratchett
When I ask what it’s for, I am not being all utilitarian. I’m just interested in exploring why stories matter so much to so many of us.
What is a story?
The Oxford English Dictionary definition is “a description of events and people that the writer or speaker has invented in order to entertain people.”
This fits nicely with my first answer. It’s certainly part of what fiction is for.
Escapism and Entertainment
It may have been possible to pretend this isn’t really a pressing human need - at least, before the pandemic and lockdown.
“Reading gives us someplace to go when we have to stay where we are.”
Mason Cooley
I think many of us with chronic illness already knew this, of course. It’s long been a useful distraction from pain and fatigue.
And we all need a break from reality sometimes, right?
But even when we are talking about escapist entertainment, there’s more to it than that.
“People talk about escapism as if it's a bad thing... Once you've escaped, once you come back, the world is not the same as when you left it. You come back to it with skills, weapons, knowledge you didn't have before. Then you are better equipped to deal with your current reality.”
Neil Gaiman
In reading fiction, even, oh, fairy tales and myths, or children’s fiction, we learn a whole lot about reality and we may through those stories develop a way to deal with the things we are afraid of.
Think of the story of Bluebeard. Lots of people interpret the story as a warning for women not to indulge their curiosity. Somehow they forget that it was the curious bride who was the one who survived!
So yes, stories are entertaining - but there’s a long list of stuff we find pleasurable which is also of real, practical value. Delicious food can also be nutritious - an analogy stolen from Lisa Cron in Story Genius. Without sex, the human race would not survive. In case you think that’s not completely a good thing, the same is true for other animals.
As writers we often start with a “what if?” question when developing a story. It’s not really surprising that stories captivate us by helping us contemplate where some of those questions might lead.
We all know there’s some truth in the stereotype of toddlers always asking “why?” Fiction seems like an extension of that curiosity for us adults, from working out why things are what they are, to imagining how they may be in the future.
As a child I devoured stories, all the stories I could lay my hands on, because I wanted to make sense of the world - and I already knew I needed a wider source for information than I could get from my family.
Theory of Mind
Confusingly, this isn’t a theory about minds. It’s a cognitive science term for our ability to imagine what is going on in someone else’s mind - or our own.
Clearly this is a very important skill for a social animal - and we start to develop it from early childhood.
Without a theory of mind we wouldn’t be able to make connections with other people - we couldn’t build friendships, fall in love, disagree, change each others minds. (Silly me, we can’t do that last part anyway!)
Without it, we wouldn’t even talk to our cats and dogs, or inanimate objects - our phones, our computers.
Listening to and observing people is clearly the start of it - but I would argue that to get a really deep insight into another person and how they think and feel, there’s no better way than to read a novel. Watching a TV drama or a film can do the same job. However, I would say that novels are often better, because of their ability to convey interiority - they can show us conflicting thoughts and emotions with real depth and nuance.
All of this cognitive work requires imagination.
I don’t think there’s a way to write a novel which doesn’t reveal a whole lot about who you are as a person, and how you think and feel about things. And why would you want to?
The impulse to write is the mirror image of the impulse to read - and it’s all about communication and connection - and it’s a way of creating shared meaning.
Writing is something you do alone. It’s a profession for introverts who wanna tell you a story but don’t wanna make eye contact while telling it.
John Green
1 - Understanding other people
Novels are the closest thing we have to telepathy - to being able to see what other people are thinking and feeling.
We can get so caught up in fictional worlds that we might talk about fictional characters as if they were real people. The same is true in television drama too - maybe to a greater extent. There was a real life example I remember when an actor who played a rapist in EastEnders was assumed by a member of the public to be an actual rapist.
So there’s a couple of interesting and contradictory aspects about how reading helps us with this.
It helps us to see that other people are actually very similar to us - that they share so many of the same thoughts and feelings.
“We read to know that we are not alone.”
C.S. Lewis
On the other hand, we read to find out about how people are different to us.
Reading fiction which is about people who are unlike us may help to build empathy - we do have a disturbing ability to be able to dehumanise, to ‘other’. This can be seen in too much political discourse at the moment - where we get the descriptions of refugees and asylum seekers as cockroaches, for instance.
And so we read about people who have different life experiences - perhaps they might be different genders, or have a different sexuality. They might be different classes or from different cultures. And it matters that these stories are authentic and not just based on stereotypes and perceptions. This is why the “Own Voices” movement matters so much - the hashtag originally started by YA author Corinne Duyvis to promote writers from marginalised groups writing about their own experiences.
That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t ever write outside our own experience, of course - but it does mean we must do the best we can to make sure our representation is not narrow, biased and stereotyped - a process that can be very difficult because obviously every minority group has a variety of views and experiences, and in fiction we are writing about individual characters, after all.
Some writers, notably Lionel Shriver, have suggested that the imposition of sensitivity readers is a form of censorship - but I see it as just a useful form of feedback on what I’ve written - just as I consult scientist friends about any science related stuff in my stories, it feels quite natural to me to consult with friends from different communities and backgrounds.
“You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who had ever been alive.”
James Baldwin
Then there are the imaginative leaps some writers make, who develop characters which are more alien. Of course there are stories like Richard Adams’ novel Watership Down which anthropomorphises other creatures. For Adams it was rabbits… And I read and loved The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein, even though the narrator is a dog. These are really no more than literary devices - there’s no real depth of doggyness or rabbitness going on. Winnie the Pooh, Thomas the Tank Engine, Myfanwy’s favourite Murderbot, all kinds of imagined and mythological creatures can also capture our imagination. This gives some hope that reading can indeed help to build the ability to empathise with those who are not like us.
2 - Connection and emotion
So all those “rules” of writing we are taught, about how to make our stories compelling, by including sensory detail, showing not telling, and evoking the emotion of our viewpoint character - even if they’re not real rules, they do have a purpose.
And here Lisa Cron explains -
"When we’re under the spell of a compelling story, we undergo internal changes along with the protagonist, and her insights become part of the way we, too, see the world. Stories instill meaning directly into our belief system the same way experience does—not by telling us what is right, but by allowing us to feel it ourselves. Because just like life, story is emotion based. As Harvard psychology professor Daniel Gilbert said, “Indeed, feelings don’t just matter, they are what mattering means.” In life, if we can’t feel emotion, we can’t make a single rational decision—it’s biology. In a story, if we’re not feeling, we’re not reading. It is emotion, rather than logic, that telegraphs meaning, thus emotion is what your novel must be wired to transmit, straight from the protagonist to us. We’re wired to crave,"
Lisa Cron, in Story Genius
I love the line she quotes from psychology professor Daniel Gilbert - “Feelings don’t just matter, they are what mattering means.”
“What a miracle it is that out of these small, flat, rigid squares of paper unfolds world after world after world, worlds that sing to you, comfort and quiet or excite you. Books help us understand who we are and how we are to behave. They show us what community and friendship mean; they show us how to live and die.”
Anne Lamott
So when we get caught up in a story, we are drawn into what is often called the fictive dream. We forget we are reading and we share the experiences of the characters.
At best, it helps us to feel a wider and more nuanced range of emotion. And we learn, at least a little, to empathise with other people and understand them better because of this imaginative broadening of our own experience.
“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies, said Jojen. The man who never reads lives only one.”
George R.R. Martin, A Dance with Dragons
3. Survival
"Story was the world’s first virtual reality. It allowed us to step out of the present and envision the future, so we could plan for the thing that has always scared us more than anything: the unknown, the unexpected. What better way to figure out how to outsmart those potential pouncing predators before they sneak up behind you?"
Lisa Cron, in Story Genius
One of my writer friends, Lesley Lathrop, sent me a link to the article on Big Think which seems relevant here.
A New Method to Boost Creativity - which talks about research showing that storytelling boosts creativity and problem solving. Storytelling and fiction has been working for us in this way for a very long time.
Stories are always about conflict, trouble. Without that driver, they would be too dull to hold our attention.
What is that all about, other than survival? We read stories about people dealing with difficult situations - from the acutely personal, to much larger societal problems.
My first encounter with the Second World War and the horrors of Nazism was through fiction - the 1956 novel by Ian Seraillier, The Silver Sword had a very powerful impact on me. We read To Kill a Mockingbird in the first year of senior school, and found out about class and racial injustice through the eyes of Scout Finch. I loved Jeanette Winterson’s novel Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit because it shone an interesting light on my childhood - from the northern setting to a childhood dominated by chapel, and that sense of not belonging. PD James’ Innocent Blood explored questions of nature and nurture in adoption in a compelling crime fiction. These are just a handful of examples of how fiction can give a deeper knowledge at all levels, from the intensely personal, through both current social and cultural issues, and historical.
And so we gain some understanding of what it means to be a human person, and how that is affected by our social and cultural and historical context. It sparks our imagination - gives us the ability, in Atticus Finch’s words from To Kill a Mockingbird, “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view … until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.”
In Conclusion
‘That bad people make good art is a cause for hope. To be human is to transgress, of that we can be sure, yet we all have the opportunity for redemption, to rise above the more lamentable parts of our nature, to do good in spite of ourselves, to make beauty from the unbeautiful, and to have the courage to present our better selves to the world.'
Nick Cave The Red Hand Files
I really like the idea that making good art can be redemptive. If it isn’t redemptive for us writers - who are all merely human - how can we hope that it might change the world for the better?
It makes a good mission statement for the writer as well as the reader - that we should use fiction to write and read ourselves into being better people - with a more nuanced understanding of ourselves, other people and the society we live in.
Fiction enriches our lives. We are all hooked on story, and it’s partly because it gives us wider and deeper knowledge about people and the world, and partly because it gives us the emotional language to find our own meaning, and understand and experience and imagine our past and our future.
“When I look back, I am so impressed again with the life-giving power of literature. If I were a young person today, trying to gain a sense of myself in the world, I would do that again by reading, just as I did when I was young.”
Maya Angelou
Ann
If you would like some editorial help with your novel draft. please do get in touch and we can have a chat. Check out my Facebook Page, at The Accomplice and message me there for more details, or get in touch through my substack email.
Please do subscribe and share if you have enjoyed reading.
LINKS
Sensitivity Readers
Does Reading Make Us Better People
Reading Increases Empathy and Understanding
Jonathan Gotschall, who wrote The Storytelling Animal, on why stories have such power over us
And I’ll just throw these Brene Brown videos in for good measure.