Did you ever see one of those bumper stickers that claims 'Life Is Not a Dress Rehearsal'? Those irritate me beyond belief. I happen to believe that this life is, indeed, a dress rehearsal, and like such exercises, can be made 'all right on the night'. Your mileage may vary, but that's the truth as I see it. I'm entitled. You're entitled to your version. And that's the end of discussing belief systems for the rest of this page. You see, I want to talk about why writers are licenced liars.

Fiction writers, I mean. Don't you dare make up fake news. There's too much of that already, and it's mostly the fault of lazy reporters who don't know how to check sources and who, like 92% percent of computer users (statistic from QI), never look past the first page of a Google search. I almost fell over when I saw that. I have been known to exhaust the Google search and be disappointed when I get to 'We have omitted duplicate pages.'

What I'm talking about are the lies we are authorised to tell and call 'fiction'. The 'what-if' stories we make up out of our observations and speculations and dreams. These are good lies, if we do them right. They are useful. They can help us and others.

If you've been trying out some of the suggestions from this column – and why not? They don't cost anything – you may now be taking anecdotes from your personal experience to use in your stories. That's good. But you aren't treating them as journalism, right? You've changed names, places, punchlines. Order of events, dialogue, age and gender of characters. You've polished the stories up so that they fit better into your story, and so that they make whatever point you were trying to make. That is a good use of this material.

You know what is a terrible use of that same material? Turning it into an urban legend, an email for the clueless to forward, or, heaven help us, a sermon illustration. But tucked into your story, you're in the clear. Nobody cares whether it really happened. Or happened that way. They only care if the story makes sense to them. Which, if you've done your work right, it will.

So what are you doing, if not just recycling your old anecdotes? You're playing 'what-if' with reality, is what you're doing. Every story is a thought experiment. You start with something that happened, or often happens. Something normal. Then you change it. You follow the change to see where it goes. It might teach us something. When scientists do this, they call it a 'thought experiment'. When you do it, it's still a thought experiment. But people usual call it a 'story'.

You know what? I can tell a lot about you by the way you tell your thought experiments. Oh, sure, you're only using fantasy or magical realism or noir or whatever because you happen to like the genre. That's like knowing what kind of topping you prefer on your pizza. That's banal. But from the way you bend reality, I can tell what you think is possible, or should be. I can also tell what you would like to have happen. I know whether you're an optimist or a pessimist, and whether you basically like people or not. And from the way your stories tend to vary, or not vary, I can tell how important a learning curve is in your life. Are you in a happy groove, or do you want to keep moving?

Yep, all that is there when you write. Anybody who reads can see it.

And the LORD answered me, and said, Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it.

Habbakuk 2:2

In fact, that's probably how you pick who to read. You tend to read people who share your outlook as well your taste in literary pizza toppings. You may think it's some absolute value you have about 'writing standards', but trust me, it's not. You're reading that writer because that writer speaks to you in some way: shares your values, represents your interests, is going somewhere you want to go.

This is also why you shouldn't feel discouraged when you write something on h2g2, we put it in the Post, and nobody around here comments. For some reason, few of the writers on h2g2 have very much in common when it comes to content preferences. One likes romance, another prefers action, some are into avant garde, others can't stand that stuff. We like each other, anyway. But the Post isn't just for the friends in the parlour, you know. It sits there, on the internet, until the lights go out on the web. Anybody could read this. Anybody does.

I once stumbled across a discussion in a forum. Two guys were arguing about the god Mithras. One of them said, 'I'll show you why you're wrong!' and then, to my horrified astonishment, trotted out a link to the Guide Entry I wrote on the subject. And these guys were theology students. I have also had a pernicious influence on German Wikipedia.

Which is to say: somewhere, somebody who likes the same pizza toppings as you will find what you wrote. It will be meaningful to them. Keep working at it. Keep telling these 'what-if' stories. Your message in a bottle will wash up on some distant electronic shore, and a weary beachcomber will delight in the find.

Excuse me, I have to go and check into the Rehab Clinic for the Metaphor-Addicted. I'll be back next week.

Writing Right with Dmitri Archive

Dmitri Gheorgheni

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