'You invent fiction, but what you invent it out of is what counts.'
Reflecting on another Hemingway insight.
A.E. Hotchner’s memoir of Hemingway brings the writer and his world to life in a way I didn’t expect. You really feel like you’re hanging out with the two of them, at the Finca or on the Pilar or in a hotel or racetrack bar or the Florida or on the road from Italy to Spain and at various points in between. Conversations are reproduced and many observations reflected upon by Hotchner, so what comes through is a full-fledged portrait of a contradictory, wounded (internally and externally), gregarious, generous, self-absorbed, egotistical, and (admittedly) brilliant American soul who played a big part in how Americans think about themselves.
That sense of the principled individualist, quiet and resourceful, who keeps all his demons contained (and sedated with alcohol), and acts with moral conviction when the time comes, this is all a part of the American macho male myth. It’s a myth because., ultimately, what our culture hasn’t allowed to ferment as part of the writer’s legacy is the vulnerability and woundedness of his characters. These characters, male or female, are only tough on the outside but a cauldron of fears, terrors, and contradictions on the inside.
It’s only when a character feels love that the vulnerability is shown to us. This is true in almost every story. But we failed to retain that lesson, that moral so central to his literature, and, instead, we held on to that shell of toughness that his characters show the world. That shell is the least interesting, most superficial parts of these characters. It’s really a shame.
Which brings me to the quote you see in the headline, that it’s not the fiction itself that counts but that fabric of life that inspires it. The quote initiates Hemingway’s discussion about Catherine, the nurse in A Farewell to Arms, and how she was inspired by the Red Nurse nurse (a well-known story) but also how other events in their romance were taken from other events in his life. The fiction is just the scaffold for him to process these people and events. And this rings very true.
Fiction means nothing if it isn’t a means for us to tackle a deep-seated question or to process trauma, grief, or some other wound suffered and which we can’t fully understand. The fiction itself is secondary. If the fiction seems primary to the experience, whether as the writer or the audience, then the work represents a wasted opportunity. It’s just a mindless page-turner or Hollywood tentpole cash grab.
I thought of The Leaving of Things, my first book which was a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age story that contained people and events directly from my life but grafted onto this invented narrative. For me, the feelings I experienced during that two-year episode of our moving to and from India in the late ’80s became the emotional palate. I needed to confront every emotion, the intense isolation, grief, anxiety, the loneliness, bitterness, confusion, and, finally, a redemptive sense of self-confidence. It wasn’t an exact replica of what I went through, but it was a reasonably sound facsimile and a kind of, I don’t know, “therapy session” in which I could explore those memories and lighten them with a sense of joy and hope that a teenager can readily summon even at the worst of times.
Even in Edge of Light, I still continue some of the same themes of friendship, the bond between father and son, the loss of a parent, grief, finding purpose as a guide to adventure, etc. And in Transcendent, the novella (due out June 6) about the sole survivor of a doomed interstellar ship, I find myself going over the same ground: isolation, lost communication, the void of space as a stand-in for the void of trust in relationships, and this sense that a person can redeem all the regrets of their past through a redemptive choice in the present. The last is a wish-fulfillment that fiction creators have engaged in for thousands of years. But it does come in handy when you need a third act.
So, yeah, it’s not the fiction, but what it represents to you, the writer, that counts. The story is just the occasion to explore for the creator and the invitation from the creator to his/her reader/viewer/audience to meet in this invented space. It’s the eddying stuff of life, the richness and mystery, that the space contains that matters.
For those of you who’d like to read Transcendent in advance, you can sign up for my Advanced Reading Copy here:
https://booksirens.com/book/PDVNJG4/FCPCPEI
I would love more advanced copy reviewers because the more reviews, the better for sales!
And click right here to pre-order your digital copy of Transcendent.