Christopher Castellani

NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH

AT MOST READINGS I GIVE FROM MY TWO NOVELS, SOME-one—usually a man—asks, “So, how come you don't just write nonfiction?”

Let's deconstruct this question for a moment.

First, there is the intimacy suggested by the “so,” as if he and I are old friends. I have just read to him from a novel set either in an Italian-American neighborhood in the 1950s or an isolated mountain village in central Italy during World War II. As a thirty-something author who (reportedly) can pass for twenty-six (on a good day), I am obviously not writing from personal experience. The novels tell stories inspired by my parents' lives, not mine. I choose to take the questioner's tone—and the question overall—as a compliment: he's telling me I've created a convincing fictional world. He believes he was there strongly enough to request that I confirm that there actually exists.

Next: “How come?” Not “why,” which would be too formal, too scholarly. We are in not a university lecture hall but a community bookstore, surrounded by frothing baristas and beefcake calendars and the homeless. The mood is casual, collaborative. I'm a novelist, therefore an accessible storyteller who's assembled a group to entertain. (I don't mind this one bit, by the way; it's a great joy and honor.) What I find interesting is that most readers view the novel form (and fiction in general) as both common and mystical. Fiction belongs to the people, like IKEA art, and yet fiction writers still invariably inspire respectful awe from those who can't fathom shaping their riotous imaginations into a sustained plot of interconnected story lines. The questioner might have asked me, “How come you're such a genius?” Or, at least, “How'd you get so lucky to publish your stuff?”

The next and most important word: just. Despite the fact that nonfiction outsells fiction, and that a book gains instant credibility and increased interest when the phrase “based on a true story” is slapped across the jacket, there is an enduring (mis)perception that nonfiction writers are “just” note takers or recorders of information rather than artisans. Some readers think, “If I had time and a stack of index cards, I, too, could write nonfiction.” And so when they meet someone like me, who is blessed with a rich and colorful family history spanning two continents, they ask, in so many words, “Why'd you bother inventing stories when they can basically write themselves?”

The truth is that nonfiction (a broad genre, of course, but in this case, the questioner and I really mean the memoir or personal essay) is incredibly difficult to write. Moreover, its authenticity is virtually impossible to certify. Truth, after all, is more elusive and less flexible than the imagination; the details and complexities of our experiences vanish as we live them; and, obviously but most importantly, our understanding of these experiences is purely subjective. The memoir or personal essay writer is heavily constricted by such realities, and it is within those restrictions that she shows her remarkable talent: to re-create lived experience using the techniques of fiction (dialogue, description, point of view, scene) while staying uncompromisingly true to “what really happened.” It's somewhat analogous to a poet choosing to write a pantoum rather than in free verse. The best nonfiction writers are exquisite storytellers and expert craftsmen; they turn the inescapability and inevitably of reality into the most thrilling and satisfying of tales.

That's the long answer to why I don't write nonfiction. The short (and guilty) answer might be: It's incredibly hard. Your plots, settings, and “characters”—yourself included—are too limited. You can't “just” do a ton of research and hold interviews and make outlines; you must have the human insight of a great novelist with double the vigilance and discipline in your analysis.

But maybe you (like many of my students) have a great true story to tell, and you are undaunted by the challenges I've put forth. Maybe this true story is important to you because it is yours alone or your parents' or your deceased neighbor's; or maybe it is broader, the untold chapter of your city or country's history. There is a good chance that the story seems overwhelming in its complexity—with numerous potential digressions and connections popping into your head as you mentally outline it—and you're feeling defeated before you've even started. Here's a purely generative exercise to help you focus. And, because I'm a novelist at heart, I've included a few options for fiction writers as well.

THE EXERCISE

Make a list of five to ten significant “firsts” and as many significant “lasts” (or “finals”) in your life. Do the same if you are writing about someone else or some thing else (a city or neighborhood). The significance can be subtle or dramatic. For example:

  1. The first time I shoplifted

  2. The first time I saw the Grateful Dead in concert

  3. The first immigrant family who moved into Anytown, USA

  4. The first boy who broke my heart

  1. The last time I saw my father

  2. The last cigarette I smoked

  3. The last major sports team victory in Bigcity, USA

  4. The last day of college

For Nonfiction Writers

Pick the first or last you find most compelling or about which you either remember the most or can research most thoroughly. Write a five-hundred- to one-thousand-word description of this event using as many sensory details as possible (sight, sound, touch, taste, smell). Your primary goal here is not to analyze the event or capture it in its entirety but to transport the reader to that time and place, to create a scene the way a director or cinematographer might.

Set the scene aside for a while, maybe a week or so. Then go back to it with fresh eyes and fill in what you can't see, smell, or touch vividly enough. Alternately, you can give the description to a trusted reader and ask him or her what may be missing.

You now have the raw material for an excellent essay, but you're missing a key element: the “turn.” The turn—which some call, quite appropriately, the “So what?”—is that bit of insight or connection beyond the event that keeps it from being purely personal or arbitrary. It is a gesture toward your ultimate goal: relevance and resonance. I think of Steve Almond's wonderful nonfiction book Candyfreak, which extravagantly describes the color, taste, smell, and texture of all sorts of chocolate bars and odd regional confections and, in many cases, the first and last times the author tasted them. The descriptions are pure pleasure in themselves but would not succeed as compelling nonfiction without the many turns and “so whats” Almond includes: that is, that his desire and near fetishizing of candy is really a desire for the family acceptance he never felt as a child; and that the disappearance of regional candies is a metaphor for a loss of American character and soul.

You want your inherently significant first or last to have this sort of meaning beyond the literal, and it is now your job to examine the raw material you've created and ask yourself if it does. If it doesn't—if it is merely a pleasant or dramatic memory that is significant only to your own life, with no metaphorical or broader implications—then it is likely not fertile enough ground for an essay or memoir.

For Fiction Writers

Though “write what you know” is perfectly sound advice, I always encourage my students to live other lives in their fiction. I think one of the main reasons new writers don't finish short stories or novels is because most adhere too closely to “what really happened” and burn out during the increasingly arduous task of re-hashing the scenes and emotions. Also, no matter how talented the writer, fiction can never live up to the richness and texture of actual experience. To expect it to do so is to set yourself up for major disappointment, which may lead you to unfairly question your skills as a writer.

So, after you have written your lists of firsts and lasts, pick the entry that feels most compelling to you. Take, for example, “the first time I shoplifted.” Jot down all the things you remember about the experience, focusing on the sensory: sights, sounds, smells. Now write the scene but change something fundamental about the experience. For example:

This exercise works because the author is confidently grounded by the actual experience but still forced to stretch his or her imagination. The more drafts you write, the further from “real life” you will get, and yet the entire piece will likely still retain a sense of authenticity.