spin

Here are a few recent comments on this forum:

and

People on this forum seem to use the term "fiction" quite a lot, but I wonder what they really mean by it and whether most people use the same idea as to what fiction is.

I would like to open up a discussion as to what we should consider is fiction here. To start the discussion off, I have supplied a number of topics which might or might not be considered fiction. They are not a particularly long list and if you think things should be included for analysis, please feel free to bring them up here.

Also, if you don't want to take part in the discussion, please give an indication as to which of the items in the poll are fiction for you.


spin

Peter Kirby

Off the cuff, I would say a fiction is a story which is stated with details having no grounding in fact or correspondence to history, instead being "made up" by an author(s).

The only one of the above I was sure to be fiction was parable, which ironically is the most noble of the genres in the list.

regards,
Peter Kirby

spamandham

I refrained from voting, because the only one on the list that is necessarily fiction is a parable. Others on the list might or might not be fiction depending on the details.

NZSkep

same and for same reasons

Llyricist

IMO, The question is poorly framed. A work in any one of those genres could be fiction (or be fictitious, or contain fiction), but none of them are necessarily fiction (including the parable, something presented as fiction could nonetheless be true).

spin

I'm happy to accept the possibility that the question is poorly framed, but as I stated in the OP I'm interested in understanding how we use the term "fiction" and you haven't helped yet. You've merely assumed the notion. Can you get further into it? Remember for example we often counterpoint truth and fiction, so for some truth cannot be fiction, though this is not the case for you, it seems.

Philosophy is sometimes presented as a dialogue in which different philosophical views are confronted in some situation, yet no-one here has yet indicated that philosophy can be fiction. Personal advice can be given in the form of a story or a parable, yet no-one called it fiction.


spin

Peter Kirby

A better poll might give samples of philosophy, parables, etc. and ask the reader to classify them as fiction or non-fiction.

regards,
Peter Kirby

Llyricist

Well my understanding of the term in its most general sense would be along the lines of: "a narrative which does not correspond with reality".

And frankly, I would say that all the narratives belonging to the genres mentioned above contain elements that would would fit that definition as well as elements that do not.

Then there are more specialized definitions which actually do depend on the intent of the promulgator of the narrative. Such as the whole genre labeled fiction, or the parable which is intended to be taken as fiction for illustration purposes, even though the correspondence to reality may be close to 1 to 1.

mountainman

A fiction involves pretence. A fiction is a story or a narrative
in which the events are not historical. (ie: the events are
fabricated from the imagination of the author).

For example, is the TF a true account of history via Josephus
or is it a fiction via Eusebius.



Pete Brown

spin

The poll is more a means of focus in a discussion about fiction rather than an end in itself in my eye. I think the term "fiction" gets thrown around very freely in an oversimplified manner. I thought it would be appropriate to test it in a poll.

My interest is what we mean by fiction in the literature we are analysing and what should be considered fiction -- or perhaps how much of what we are analysing should be considered fiction, seeing as the purpose of a text, of a narrative, may be intended for exemplary, philosophical, political or other purposes. Calling them fiction may be quite unhelpful.

Let's beat about the implications of labelling something as fiction.


spin