Interesting thought for the day: All storytellers are liars.
Authors, poets, filmmakers, artists … We make things up. We show things to audiences that aren’t real.
But we’re liars who admit we’re liars. The things we tell in our stories are acknowledged as fiction. That’s why it’s called “fiction” and not “deception.”
There is an unspoken agreement between storyteller and audience: I will tell you something untrue, and you will treat it as something true until the story is ended. Audiences know that they are witnessing a fabrication, and so it is acceptable.
But stories do discuss real things – people, events, feelings, ideas, places – although the story itself isn’t true. Even if it is retelling a piece of history, it’s prefaced by the words “Based on a true story.”
Yet if it presents itself as real history, but isn’t, then it’s an actual lie.
Stories are lies that know they are lies and willingly admit it. And so they aren’t true lies, because they don’t pretend to be anything else.
Many thanks for visiting my blog. I post updates on my writing career, I muse over storytelling and fiction, and I reflect on the curious and wonderful things in life.
Jake W. Powell 