To the 'It's only fiction!' camp, I direct to you part of a quote from the movie
V for Vendetta.
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Evey Hammond
My father was a writer. You would've liked him. He used to say that artists use lies to tell the truth...
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Lies exist solely to direct meaning. They are merely a
separate form of truth, whatever truth is, not the opposition to it. Have you never experienced a situation in which you learn far more by how a person tries
not to react to an experience than by how he does? Do you ever listen to what people make a conscious effort not to say? Take the time to listen to the quality of the silence? Every word holds within it secret meaning, if you take a moment to truly listen.
You ask why is fiction written; for any reason but to tell a story? Surely not. To direct meaning as such seems manipulative; dirty. The magic is lost for it. But what is a story but the artistic conveyance of an idea? And what is an idea conveyed as such but some veiled form of truth that the author finds important enough to share in such a way?
It is only fiction. Yes, it is fiction, but surely it is more than only.