Dear all, I have
spent the day ill in bed, I thought I was picking up but overnight the cold
came back with a vengeance. Before I give you my address to send over all your
flowers, chocolates and death threats to stop writing I thought I would talk about
using real life events in fiction. The reason this came to mind is that in
between bouts of sleep and taking paracetamol I have been watching news channels
such as the BBC and CNN most of the day.
Without going into any political
discussions here it goes without saying the Ukraine situation has taken the
largest chunk of the coverage along with the Oscar Pistorius trial and whatever
your views I want to relate it to fiction writing. I don’t want to trivialize
them because they don’t affect me, it is just that this is a blog on my views
on writing and I don’t want to sound as if I am an expert on these issues when
I am not, and that is exactly the point of this post.
I am interested in writing fiction
that has in the main, a contemporary setting and today has made me think about
how I go about incorporating real events and the implications of doing so.
The first question I have is how do I select
the events to use? This will in part be answered by the development of the
story and the direction it may take, but before I get on to that choice being
made for me by the characters I create, there will also no doubt be a decision
I as the writer, or by default the narrator I chose, makes. You see, for
example, if I have contemporary London as the background to a story, there is
only so much I can fit into to the descriptions of every day life, I can’t
repeat every news story, every cultural event, every law, every court case,
every sports event and so on, just as I can’t use every historical event that
has ever happened to show why and how the current setting is the way it is. I
have to choose and the process by which I do that I am not sure about. Sorry to
keep using London but it’s my home and very likely the setting for a lot of my
stories to come so I have to examine that. It is a city of over 8 million
people, how do I select which cultures to involve, which religions, which
institutions, which buildings, etc.?
If I am writing a story that has 2014 as part of its
time frame is it my duty to include the Ukraine crisis because that is such a
huge story I cannot pretend it isn’t happening even if it has nothing to do
whatsoever with my story, but as a backdrop it is something that would look
ridiculous by its omission? The thing is, I may think it is a huge story but I
bet there are people that couldn’t give a flying fig about it and may not be
paying attention at all. Then again, I could use that excuse for any topic! How
do I actually know?
What level of research do I need to do before I feel
qualified to involve a real life event and then what level of responsibility do
I have to justify what I say? Do I have free reign to make up whatever the hell
I like? Can I change things? For instance, can I use a real event but then
fictionalize parts to suit my needs? I’m not talking about a general ‘rule’ for
fiction writing, there are no doubts legal implications that any writer and
publisher would need to know and work to concerning all sorts of issues that are
simply not up for discussion. We all know about famous examples of the right to
free speech and where this line may vary country to country, also the
difference between creating fictional drama and purposefully using fiction to
portray racism, homophobia, etc. I don’t want to discuss that here as I am not
qualified to and it’s not really the subject I am interested in, that is something
to take up another time, this is just a general point about the limits I feel I
have, or rather, the limits I want to set myself for my particular type or
style of writing.
What I am really interested in is character
development. How do I build a character up by including background information
that is relevant to my story but also based in reality? I guess one way of
looking at it is how do I not hide behind a character by being selective in
what I use? If I am to create interesting individuals that are believable they
cannot just be different facets of my own personality, so the things I watch
and read and learn about will be different with multiple characters. What
research is needed to find and create other truthful characters with varying
beliefs, interests, jobs, families and so on? It’s a twist on the character
development issues I have spoken about before and remember studying about in my
degree.
For instance, depending on what time of the day and
what channel I caught the news, I may have heard and seen different interviews,
different guest speakers, different recorded clips, different angles or
views…all of that may or may not go into my characters, what level of research
is needed before I think I am happy to go ahead with it? You have the usual
research, books and reference libraries, Internet searching and research
papers, etc. but do I need to go even further? Do I need to interview people from
both sides of an argument? To go further on the above point, I could have sat
glued in front of the television all day and purchased every single newspaper
and feel as well informed as possible…but still only from the western viewpoint
in what was available to me. I wouldn’t have been able to watch any Russian
television, Russian news, Russian newspapers and so if for arguments sake I had
an everyday normal Russian character in my story how would I know what they
would have been told compared to a Ukrainian…or an American…and so on, I can’t
use my information to build that character up because in reality they would
have been built up using entirely different sets of information. Just
wondering.
What about using not only real life events but real
life people? Am I justified in throwing about names if I am not an expert on
them? An example from today would be using Putin’s name in a story. Do I need
to read some biographies on him before feeling okay about doing that or can I
just say that if the character doesn’t know anything about him then I don’t
need to either? Does it really matter? Who is going to judge the quality of
setting if it is a tiny part of the story? Can I simply hide behind the characters
and leave it at that?
The difference would be using a real life event as
the core fundamental concept of the book. As a reader I can’t say I know much
about Indian independence from British rule but what if as a writer I wanted to
use that? I’m obviously talking about one of the greats here, Salman Rushdie
and Midnight’s Children. Slightly different to my ability I’ll grant you ;) my
level is probably more to do with the closing of a pub in my local High Street,
not exactly a high-level global political diplomatic earthquake but by using a
famous example I hope you get my drift. I don’t think at this stage of my
ability i.e. the very beginning, I have got it in me to make any grand
political statements but it is just a thought!
It is something I will keep in mind and take seriously
as the years go on because I do feel that I want to use real life events in my
work but to what extent I want to use them to make an interesting and realistic
story, or to make any social or political points I don’t know, that will emerge
as I start writing I guess.
RGR
www.thinkingplainly.com
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