What do I want to write? I know I'd like to write some sort of edgy novel ... a bit of science fiction / fantasy that indulges my dark side. But is it in me to write that today? Probably not. I want to run away with Foucault's idea that we believe in so much that boils down to rhetoric. Do I KNOW that there are billions of people in the world from personal experience? No. I haven't counted. But it seems logical and WHY WOULD THEY LIE?? so I believe it. Do I know that the world is round because I have sailed around the globe? No. But the argument has been made well and I have been raised to believe in it, so I have no reason to question it. But it seems to me that many opportunities for fiction lie in the questioning of these assumptions. Do I know that the stars above me at night are actually there? No. But I have been taught to believe that they are so I do.
Furthermore, can I really be sure that characters in a work of fiction do not exist? I suppose it is the work of an author to convince his audience that the possibility exists. Fiction's role, rather than to confine the mind to an idea from childhood, is to allow it to accept a reality outside of these confines. It holds the task of setting up confines that are, oftentimes, contrary to those of reality. An author must confine his reader in the span of a few hundred pages, rather than the time allowed by a society (a lifetime).
I love rhetoric.
Furthermore, can I really be sure that characters in a work of fiction do not exist? I suppose it is the work of an author to convince his audience that the possibility exists. Fiction's role, rather than to confine the mind to an idea from childhood, is to allow it to accept a reality outside of these confines. It holds the task of setting up confines that are, oftentimes, contrary to those of reality. An author must confine his reader in the span of a few hundred pages, rather than the time allowed by a society (a lifetime).
I love rhetoric.
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