If postmodernism has taught us anything it’s that there’s a thin line between fact and fiction. We are taught to doubt history, question the narratives on which our culture is based and accept rewritings as just another perspective on ‘the truth’.
In publishing, however, the line is clearly drawn. Books fall definitively into one of two categories, fiction or non-fiction. The best-seller charts are constructed on this format, imprints – and indeed whole publishing houses – are defined by it and marketing departments swear by it. The ‘true story’ label is the ultimate USP.
It is no wonder, then, that recent revelations about the fictionalisation of so-called ‘memoirs’ has caused uproar. The most recent of these is Margaret Seltzer’s Love and Consequences. Presented as the memoir of a mixed-race drugs runner from South Central LA, it was revealed, just a week after the book’s publication, that the entire story was fabricated. Seltzer, aka Margaret B Jones is all white and grew up in a well-to-do area of the city. She justified her actions as her ‘opportunity to put a voice to people who people don’t listen to’.
Needless to say publishers, readers and those close to Jones feel betrayed by her actions. In fact, far from giving a voice to the vulnerable, it is likely that, by causing suspicion of the genre as a whole, she has helped to prevent the publication of future true-life stories. When a novelisation will often have just as much resonance, what is it that makes a writer dishonestly present a story as a true-life experience?
It all began with James Frey and A Million Little Pieces. When the book was chosen by Oprah’s book club it was labelled a ‘radical departure’. Oprah herself described it as ‘like nothing you’ve ever read before…’, and in 2005, the year in which Oprah promoted the book it sold 1.77 million copies in the US, more than any other title.
It turned out, however, that large elements of Frey’s, so-called memoir were fabricated. The former drug addict and purported criminal, who claimed in the work to have had dramatic run-ins with police had exaggerated and, in some cases, wholly invented elements of the story. The revelation caused a scandal, leading to a showdown interview on Oprah’s show. But it proved difficult to get to the bottom of the case as Frey claimed not to be able to remember specific facts about the story.
And this is perhaps the most fascinating aspect of the memoirist-cum-novelist. There seems to exist a level of confusion in the writer about whether or not they have been conveying the truth. This is particularly the case with Belgian writer Misha Defonseca. Defonseca recently revealed the best-selling Misha: A Memoir of the Holocaust Years to be ‘not actually reality, but my reality, my way of surviving’.
The author of the memoir, which describes how as a child she wandered the forests of Europe alone for four years after the seizure of her parents by the Nazis, said there were moments when she ‘found it difficult to differentiate between what was real and what was part of my imagination.’
Whether this is genuine confusion or simply another good ruse, it raises the pertinent question in this issue – to what extent can something remembered and reconstructed as narrative ever truly reflect events as they happened?
All writing is necessarily tinged with personal interpretation. Different biographies of the same individual will approach the subject from a wildly contrasting viewpoint. At the same time a lot of so-called fiction is based on personal experience, and novelists don’t feel the need to define their work as utterly imagined.
Viewed in this light, publishers’ classifications of ‘fiction’ or ‘non-fiction’ seem procrustean. As a reader, what matters more than whether or not a story is true is believability, the ability to convey convincing human emotion. So why do publishers force writers to conform to these strict categories?
In the case of so-called ‘misery’ memoirs, which feature characters overcoming horrific ills, publishers claim the ‘realism’ offers inspiration. They believe this gives others the moral strength to endure similar adversity. However, presented with vulnerable, much abused characters, what a reader feels is more akin to morbid fascination.
No doubt, following the recent revelations about fabricated memoirs publishers will come under greater pressure to fact-check the works they produce. They are unlikely, due to time and financial restraints, to be persuaded to check the veracity of every ‘memoir’ that passes through their hands. Furthermore, few narrative works of any nature would stand up to such stringent demands for truth. So in the future works that are loosely based on a true story are likely to be marketed as fiction. One positive result of this scandal is that it may spell the end of the line for the dubious genre of the ‘misery memoir’.
Sources:
http://sycamorereview.com/blog/2008/3/4/fake-memoirs.html
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/books/02/29/holocaust.bookhoax.ap/index.html
http://www.nysun.com/article/72301
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0104061jamesfrey1.html
http://www.panmacmillan.com/picador/ManageBlog.aspx?BlogID=1ae541b9-65cf-48ce-9b35-edd7b2ca5731&BlogPage=Permalink
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/columnists/columnists.html?in_article_id=540208&in_page_id=1772&in_author_id=465
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/mar/20/1
