Real-life ideas in fiction?

[ljwrites]

What do you think about using political, social, religious and other ideas in fiction-writing? Do your beliefs find their way into your work, and if so how? Alternately, do you believe enjoyable fiction is free of ideology and partisanship?

These questions were touched off in me when members of another comm that I admin were quite open about expressing political and moral ideas through their works. I've given a lot of thought to this issue, too, for instance in a long rant about a post by Holly Lisle on her website, in my review of Changes by Jim Butcher, my review of Frozen, my review of Kingdom of Heaven and... oh, let's face it, everything I've ever written, including fiction. Especially fiction. As I noted in the Changes review, my political views are inextricable from the literary.

That's not to say my goal is to preach or proselytize, quite the opposite in fact. I believe the role of fiction is to tell a truth that lies beyond and below facts. Having an uncompromising agenda tends to distort the truth, and if a writer finds herself going into contortions to make her side look good then she has some issues to work out before she can write to her full potential. On the other hand, truth doesn't exist free of viewpoints, and every work of fiction has some moral standpoint no matter how well or poorly expressed. That's the way I see it, anyway. What do you think?

Comments

[agilebrit]

I've written several stories with recognizably Biblical angels and demons in them, and they certainly reflect my own ideas on how such things would "work" in the "real world" were they more obvious. In fact, I daresay that I would be constitutionally unable to write something that went astray from my deeply-held beliefs in that regard, at least in any meaningful way. It's a major reason why most fiction that stars angels leaves me cold--I can't suspend my disbelief enough to actually enjoy the story.

And there's nothing wrong with that. "Write what you love" is and always has been my mantra.

That being said, it all depends on the story you're trying to tell. I have other stories in which my religious viewpoint is conspicuously absent, and in which characters act in ways (such as killing an antagonist who is down and helpless) that are the opposite of what I would do--but are true to what that character would do.

In the end, all fiction is message fiction. The problem comes, in my view, when Story is sacrificed to Message, and where Message is shoehorned down our throats with a garden trowel. Most of the time, I have no idea what Message I'm aiming for until the story is actually complete.

[ljwrites]

In the end, all fiction is message fiction.

That would seem to be the money quote for this thread. I would also argue that the most effective message is the story itself--that is, story given the freedom to reach its own organic conclusion and mean different things to different people, which is as story should be.