Archive for January 10th, 2011

To actually participate in this poll, you can go to my Livejournal blog.

Are writers always selling somebody out, telling the family secrets and passing it off as fiction, portraying someone they’ve known as a jerk to get revenge, or otherwise Spilling the Beans?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Spilling the beans.
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Are writers always selling somebody out?

● I think that’s more true of literary fiction than genre fiction.
● Sure. Writers always have hidden agendas. They just tell people it’s all made up.
● No. It’s all just fiction, part of the creative process.
● Too much personal history in fiction is so transparent no one will buy it/want to read it.
● Unless you make it really salacious and it’s well-written.
● Or just really salacious sometimes.
● Sometimes it’s disguised personal business, sometimes it’s all made up.
● Good fiction always has a grain of truth in it so people can relate to it.
● But the art in fiction comes in making it universal rather than deeply personal.
● Whether it’s personal or not most readers assume it’s personal.
● Ticky never did mind about the little things.
● Other.

Random quote of the day:

“That is one last thing to remember: writers are always selling somebody out.”

—Joan Didion, preface to Slouching Towards Bethlehem: Essays of Joan Didion


Disclaimer:  The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.