A different truth

[John Updike]'s decisions were upsetting to me. I'm a journalist by trade and a fiction writer by heart. I grew up believing the media gives us the "who, what and when" of our communities, but it is the fiction that creates for us the story of what people actually experience. The...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Colorlines (Oakland, Calif.) Calif.), 2006-11, Vol.9 (4), p.3
Main Author: Hernandez, Daisy
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Criticism and interpretation
Novelists
Political aspects
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:[John Updike]'s decisions were upsetting to me. I'm a journalist by trade and a fiction writer by heart. I grew up believing the media gives us the "who, what and when" of our communities, but it is the fiction that creates for us the story of what people actually experience. The fiction gives meaning to abuses that at first glance seem only cruel. It's fiction that most accurately portrays our potential for surviving and fighting for what we believe in. I think Updike shares this idea, but he takes it to mean that we write fiction from a place of shared humanity that transcends war and institutional racism. I believe it's the opposite-that, writing from the specifics of their experience, novelists create a link to readers' emotional lives and perhaps move them to political action.
ISSN:1098-3503