Friday, July 28, 2006

No such thing as Non Fiction

The Weekend Without Echoes was a huge success. I became silent throughout the period as I spent more time reading blogs and did not want to ruin the intents of the weekend by posting a blog on a subject that was written about so many of times before. A week had passed before I decided it was time to post a new post.

Reading through so many blogs this past weekend I encountered in interesting phenomena. Bloggers can comment on the same material but present it in different views. The latest news from the crisis in the Middle East has created the same oppositional views throughout the media. Media in the United States try to not show an images too grotesque while media from overseas are graphic beckoning for peace and tranquility while showing what horrors the conflict cause. The doors to debate arise and different opinions arise. This is a natural course, but the phenomena is not the opposing views. The phenomena I had noticed is that nonfiction is nonexistant. In order for a book, article, or blog to be labeled nonfiction it must be factual without any input of fiction. As writers, we each create opinions upon our writings with or without our own knowledge of the action.

What is fiction? Dictionary.com says it is A literary work whose content is produced by the imagination and is not necessarily based on fact.

What is nonfiction? Dictionary.com says it is prose writing that is not fictional.

An author upon a historical icon may include only the data in which he enjoys; therefore not fulfilling his duties for the readers and including all the data that would allow the reader to form his own opinion upon the historical icon. Of course readers have the same faults as readers have their own opinions and shift through any data that may be presented in front of them but only read through the material that they believe to side with their opinion.

We can see this in any material. Graphs that display the Nation's economic progress may be different between two oppossing economists who use the same material. We can see this evidence in any newspaper or news channel as they may try to report facts, but in fact, display only their opinions upon any topic.

Is there any way to end this nonexistence of nonfiction? Of course not. Nonfiction is only fact filled fiction. A book on capitalism or socialism will always be a case of fiction. When reading Mises' The AntiCapitalistic Mentality, you receive the notion that there is nothing better than capitalism, really there isn't, but if you should read the Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx you receive a different set of values upon Capitalism. There is no such thing as nonfiction; only a job for each reader to read through the fiction to find the facts.

2 comments:

F.T. Rea said...

Fiction is when the writer has decided, for whatever reason, to have his way with the truth. But somewhere in there, if the words have any weight to them, it happened.

Ian Dunois said...

thanks f.t. rea for your input.