Every creative writing student in creation ought to read Tim O'Brien's essay "Telling Tails" in the Atlantic's summer fiction issue. The fiction itself is great--I won't soon forget Tea Obreht's "The Laugh" with its blood and passion and tenderness, and "PS" by Jill McCorkle made me laugh out loud in a doctor's waiting room full of sick people watching Dr. Phil, which is quite an accomplishment.
But the piece that will stick with me and eventually find its way to my writing students is O'Brien's wonderful essay, which playfully evokes small boys' bedtime and breakfast rituals and superhero fixations while attending to a serious topic: "the centrality of imagination in enduring fiction."
O'Brien notes that in many writing workshops, "classroom discussion seems to revolve almost exclusively around issues of verisimilitude. Declarations such as these abound: I didn't believe in that character. I need to know more about that character's background. I can't see that character's face. I don't understand why that character would behave so insipidly (or violently, or whatever)."
"These are legitimate questions," admits O'Brien. "But for me, as a reader, the more dangerous problem with unsuccessful stories is usually much less complex: I am bored. And I would remain bored even if the story were packed with pages of detail aimed at establishing verisimilitude."
The problem, says O'Brien, is that it's simply easier for writing workshops to focus on issues of verisimilitude than to tackle the real problem: "the failure of imagination." Having diagnosed the problem, O'Brien offers some concrete solutions illustrated with charming original tales about tails--but for that, you'll have to read the essay.
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