Fiction
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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- cult fiction, transgressive fiction
- Fiction is a fundamental part of human culture, and the ability to create literature and other artistic works by using one's imagination is frequently cited as one of the defining characteristics of humanity.
- By definition, fiction is "untruth." Since untruth is contrary to truth, and because truth is a virtue, does that not make untruth found in fiction a vice? --anonymous catholic quote
- For Plato poetry (and, more specifically, fiction) is untruth and unworthy of a philosopher. --D.H. Green via The Beginnings of Medieval Romance
- Since the 17th century the term fiction is often used synonymously with literature and more specifically novels. From a high/low culture point of view, fiction is subdivided in popular fiction (e.g., Stephen King) and literary fiction (e.g., James Joyce).
Fiction (from the Latin fingere, "to form, create") is storytelling of imagined events and stands in contrast to non-fiction, which makes factual claims that can be substantiated with evidence.
Fictional works – novels, short stories, fables, fairy tales, films, comics, animation, video games – may include or reference factual occurrences. The term is also often used synonymously with literature and more specifically fictional prose. In this sense, fiction refers only to novels or short stories and is often divided into two categories, popular fiction (e.g., science fiction, mystery fiction, or romance novels) and literary fiction (e.g., Marcel Proust or William Faulkner).
History of fiction
Four steps in the history of fiction:
- People tell tall stories by the campfire
- People come up with idea to act out these stories, which becomes theatre
- The novel is invented for the solitary enjoyment of fiction (see Eugène Sue)
- Film replaces the novel as primary source of fiction
Reading novels was popular from the print revolution to the advent of sound film.
Early 20th century
The beginning of the 20th century saw the arrival of film as a new medium. By and large, what people wanted to watch on the screen did not differ from what they expected to see on the stage or read in short stories and novels: the good and the bad things in life (clearly separated from each other); virtue and vice; human prowess and human weakness; sin and redemption; and, probably more than anything else, poetic justice, or iustitia commutativa, as it is called according to Aristotle, with everyone getting what they deserve. In this respect, the cinema has always served as a means of escape from real life, though a temporary one. This escapist function of both literature and film did not change substantially in the course of the 20th century: One still feels uncomfortable if at the end of a film the "bad guy" gets away with all his evil doings, if order is not restored, if justice does not succeed in the end. Subconsciously, an average human feels that if the wicked character is not punished, the film comes too close to reality and makes the person remember, rather than forget his inadequate life.
See also
