The Purpose of Fiction -- Revisited

If asked, most people would probably say fiction is a form of entertainment -- in contrast to, say, non-fiction, which would probably be identified as a form of enlightenment.

But fiction is arguably other things as well.





For instance, author Tyrese Coleman, in an article entitled "The Privilege of Escapism is Not Allowed For Me" asserts that the main reason people read fiction is to get away from their ordinary lives -- into some other place. That's a little different from entertainment, which can be viewed as a normal part of everyday life as opposed to an escape from it.

In the article, Coleman complains that she can't escape into the world of  Charlotte Brontë's classic book "Jane Eyre" because of Brontë's racial prejudice. This, she says, is in contrast to the world of Jane Austin whose books "lend themselves to replacing white characters for black or any other kind of ethnicity because race is absent from the narrative."

Coleman's article attracted many comments.

And here's a related earlier post on the topic of racism in fiction.

Elsewhere, Eric Thurm, in article entitled "We Still Need The Morality Lessons of Philip Pullman," argues that a primary purpose of fiction is to instruct readers about right and wrong -- morality and ethics. Here, a good story presumably plays the role of the spoonful of sugar that makes the medicine go down.

The stories of Pullman that he highlights are perhaps a bit problematic in that context, but that doesn't seem to bother Thrum. For instance, one of Pullman's characters that he cites with approval because the character "does his best, and acts well"  commits murder while so doing. Life is complex and often involves difficult choices, whether or not to kill another person presumably being one anyone could face.

That aside for the moment, the article makes some interesting assertions.

"Almost all ethical thinking happens in the context of stories" -- from ancient myths and religious parables to all forms of modern narratives, Thurm says, arguing that Pullman's elaborate works of fantasy -- stories that include plenty of mayhem -- contain a host of moral lessons.

"Pullman makes no secret of writing with such takeaways in mind," he says.

Here's Thurm's bottom line:

"Being a living American person in 2017 is also complex. Faced with an obvious crisis, many of the nation’s critics have retreated to a form of simple moral alarmism, in which we “need” certain types of art, “now more than ever.” Usually, this art entails the bare act of attempting to depict the presence of human kindness, or bringing up the fact that politics can be bad. The solution is never that simple, of course—the mere existence of a heroic role model accomplishes nothing, unless a reader is compelled to want to engage with the character, to think as they do. That’s a task that requires teaching people not just to read the right things but to read well: to pick up on the small details that change our understanding of others and of ourselves.

I suspect I will have more to say on this topic -- the purpose of fiction -- in due course.

Meanwhile, for earlier articles of the subject of fiction and morality, please click here and here.