The Non-Fiction Novel: A Flight From Fantasy

by George Flexior

Telemarketing Manager

Where Books Begin

Dr. Seuss reports how disappointed he was when he finally met Jackie Onassis at a New York Public Library gala. Expecting brilliant conversation, instead he found himself answering the same banal question he was always asked at parties, “Where do you get your ideas?” Dr. Seuss had some interesting answers to that question, but most writers don’t. They simply help themselves to other people’s lives. It’s what Lady Caroline did to Lord Byron in Glenarvon; it’s what Harold Robbins did to Howard Hughes in The Carpetbaggers and what Jackie Susann did to Judy Garland in Valley of the Dolls. After helping themselves to the plots of other people’s lives, out of vanity or guile, the writers call their work fiction and avoid being sued for libel or scolded by Oprah on national television.

This is not simply Scott Fitzgerald writing about Gerald and Sara Murphy in Tender is the Night, or even Jack Kerouac maligning Neal Cassady in On The Road. This is wholesale appropriation of the hot celebrity stories that Page Six, People Magazine and the gossip-hungry TV show TMZ can only hint at. And as a literate American, I think this is fine. Fifty years ago, Walter Winchell and Louella Parsons did not bring down civilization writing about Debbie and Eddie and Liz. or Dominick Dunne spoofing John Gutfreund in People Like Us.

But when the topics get political, I get nervous. We can’t vote intelligently if we are getting bad information from propagandists hiding behind the First Amendment. I see trouble brewing across the Atlantic and have spent some time considering whether it can happen here.

In the UK, Severn House is publishing a historical novel—with footnotes, can you believe it?—called My Friend Hitler by German television writer Claus Hant. Hant cagily tells his story in the first person, through the eyes of Hitler’s best friend. The homoerotic subtext is only hinted at, but the power of the prose pulls the reader along. And though it’s classified as fiction, a preface by a leading historian makes it all feel legitimate.

In France, where writers are unconcerned with legitimacy but are obsessed with style, editor Justine Levy’s book, Rien de Grave, pushed The Da Vinci Code off the top of the fiction best seller list. This expose of Madame Sarkozy’s promiscuity sold well in the US as well, combining the plot of a TV-movie with language worthy of a poet. Jeffrey Archer has been tickling readers for decades with the skinny on Saddam Hussein and Warren Christopher hidden in his preposterous plots. What does this European trend bode for America as we move into the elections?

The political novel is something of an American tradition. Edwin O’Connor’s novel about Mayor Curley The Last Hurrah and Robert Penn Warren’s examination of Governor Huey Long –All The King’s Men--were both major movies. Washington insider Joe Klein’s Primary Colors didn’t come out until the Clintons, whose election it chronicles, were safely in the White House but it started some baseless rumors which persist. William F. Weld, the former governor of Massachusetts, uses a minor player in Mackerel By Moonlight to showcase insiders like Abe Fortas to show us how Easterners inside the Beltway have corrupted American political safeguards. In an age where young people watch Comedy Central for their evening news and the spin on Fox is dizzying, one could worry about fiction as yet another tool for voter manipulation.

Fortunately for the elections, Romney, McCain, Biden and Obama protected themselves against the onslaught of Nonfiction Novels by writing their own books, clearly and completely non-fiction.

 Obama is that rara avis, the politician who writes his own books. McCain has a different style, working with a professional writer to get it down on paper, but he tells his stories so vividly that many of them stand verbatim on the pages of Faith of My Fathers. No Apology is less personal, more political  but it allowed Romney to speak for himself. But for the moment we have candidates whose own larger-than-life stories prove the point that truth is not only stranger than fiction (or comedy routines or gossip shows) but also a better predictor of Presidential behavior.

HOW TO TELL WHEN YOU ARE BEING MANIPULATED BY A NONFICTION NOVELIST

-- The writer includes telling details from the real life event, such as a sapphire tiara or a Mexican mother that ring bells with the reader, conscious or unconscious.

-- The writer doesn’t waste words on establishing settings, but chooses clichéd milieus such as the White House, The Graham Norton Show or Langley.

-- The writer leaves out details that slow the story down, even if they are important to a fair representation. Yes, he spent the night with a 14-year-old boy, without mentioning the kid is his nephew.

-- The dialogue reads as a parody of what the subject says in real interviews. It’s as if the author listened to Larry King and then reduced the responses to a dozen characteristic phrases.

-- The author exaggerates the limited third person point of view. Supporting characters come in from all sides but the author makes sure everything happens to or through the main character.

-- For all his irresponsibility in stealing a real-life person’s story, the author chooses a tone that understates, nearly drones on, like British cozy. This creates a matter-of-fact tone that makes the nonfiction fiction believable.

-- The author is telling you, not showing you. When an author is using a real-life character and real life events, s/he depends on narration more than s/he would in a mainstream novel.

-- When you get to sections that are already familiar from news coverage and celebrity gossip, you will see that the narration slows down so that the reader can savor his “in the know” perspective.