Does Fiction Writing Have Value? –Matt

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, they say.  They, who say this, are probably ugly.  The reason they say this is to explain that intangible ideas, like beauty, are subjective, not objective.  There is no standardizing measuring stick for beauty.  Some find beauty in a swamp, other on a mountain peak.  They are both right. They are both wrong.  And that is ok.

If you told me fiction writing was beautiful I would say, ‘ok’ and move on with life.  How do you argue with that?  But the question here is if fiction writing has value.  Value is tangible, measurable, and objective.  For something to have value it must have a use and that use must be desirable.  A banana slicer has a use, but it is not seen as desirable.  Its value is minimal if any.

Fiction writing deals in the make believe.  It is a construct of the author and based wholly in their imagination.  The characters have never lived; the places have never existed; the story is a complete fabrication.  It may be a permutation of real life, drawing on real world context, or it may not be based on anything that has ever existed.  But the characters have never dwelt outside the pages of the book.

I recently discovered that there have been enough Lego’s made that everyone on the planet could have 62 pieces.  That is 434 billion Lego’s!  It is funny to picture everyone on earth holding a little bag full of 62 Lego’s.  Imagine now that we had a contest to see who could build the most wonderful creation using those 62 Lego’s.   No doubt that someone would construct a replica of the Eiffel Tower and that many, many more would have an exact replica of 62 Lego’s piled together.  This is what fiction writing is.

We all have stories, we all have imaginations.  No doubt some are better constructed than others, but we all have a bag of 62 Lego’s.  How I arrange my pieces is simple a function of my subjective view of what they should be.  My assemblage has no more value than anyone else who arranges their pieces. 

Value is something that has a desirable useful function.  A house, a car, real money has value.  Given that 7 billion people have imaginations (or 62 Lego’s) I fail to see how one person’s imagination is more useful than someone else’s. 

Fiction writing may be enjoyable to read, it may be an escape from reality, but really it is just the preference of one assemblage over another.  If beauty is in the eye of the beholder then there is no ugly and there is no beauty.  There just is.  Fiction writing just is.  It has no value.  But it may not need to.  Value may not be the point.

Does Fiction Writing Have Value? - George

In Dorothy Sayers’ book, The Mind of the Maker, she writes,

“All language about God must necessarily be analogical. We need not be surprised at this, still less suppose that because it is analogical it is therefore valueless or without any relation to the truth. The fact is, that all language about everything is analogical; we think in a series of metaphors, We can explain nothing in terms of itself, but only in terms of other things. Even mathematics can express itself in terms of itself only so long as it deals with an ideal system of pure numbers; the moment it begins to deal with numbers of things it is forced back into the language of analogy. In particular, when we speak about something of which we have no direct experience, we must think by analogy or refrain from thought. It may be perilous, as it must be inadequate, to interpret God by analogy with ourselves, but we are compelled to do so; we have no other means of interpreting anything.”

Sayers is not inventing a new theory here. Language and understanding have been described this way for centuries. And if it is true that we think in metaphors and can only explain things in terms of other things, then stories are not only valuable, but invaluable.

This does not necessarily validate fictional stories. Metaphors and stories also come in non-fiction varieties. Some might argue that non-fiction stories are the only useful stories. They would say only true stories are valuable and only non-fiction can be considered true. I agree that only true stories are valuable. But I would disagree that only non-fiction stories can be true stories.

All non-fiction stories are edited. The narrative is interpreted and then shaped from a infinite harvest field of facts. The teller of the story selects moments and orchestrates the narrative to communicate a particular agenda. The truth of the story depends on how faithfully he tells it. What classifies the story non-fiction is that the elements of the story are selected from history, not because of its truthfulness. In other words, non-fiction stories are not necessarily true stories. True stories are defined by other terms.

In Humphrey Carpenter’s biography of J.R.R. Tolkien, Carpenter describes a conversation between Tolkien and Lewis before Lewis became a Christian. Lewis is struggling with the falsehood of the myths that he loves. Tolkien contradicts this characterization of myth and says,

“You call a tree a tree, he said, and you think nothing more of the word. But it was not a 'tree' until someone gave it that name. You call a star a star, and say it is just a ball of matter moving on a mathematical course. But that is merely how you see it. By so naming things and describing them you are only inventing your own terms about them. And just as speech is invention about objects and ideas, so myth is invention about truth. We have come from God, and inevitably the myths woven by us, though they contain error, will also reflect a splintered fragment of the true light, the eternal truth that is with God. Indeed only by myth-making, only by becoming a 'sub-creator' and inventing stories, can Man aspire to the state of perfection that he knew before the Fall. Our myths may be misguided, but they steer however shakily towards the true harbour.”

This quote from Tolkien is consistent with Sayers' quote above. If we are those who understand via analogy and metaphor, then true stories are what is needed most for us to grow in understanding. True stories train us and lead us toward wisdom. The truth of stories depends upon its analogical accuracy and usefulness for understanding. Just like non-fiction, not all fiction literature is true story. And (also like non-fiction) fiction will contain error. But as Tolkien says of myth, “they steer however shakily toward the true harbour.”

Is fiction valuable? True fiction is of the highest value.