"Most writers regard truth as their most valuable possession, and therefore are most economical in its use. "  
   --Mark Twain


UNIT 5     WHAT IS TRUTH?

WHY TRUTH?

Autobiographical or non-fiction writing dictates that characters, time, and place are accurate at all times. You can authenticate the material you collect by consulting with relatives, and exploring family records and documents, public records, library references, physical locations, and any other available sources to authenticate your information. Facts are the data that give credence to storytelling. It is an historian's obligation to be truthful, and, when in doubt, attribute the interpretation of information to yourself.

Always be on the lookout for contradiction, which facts may challenge. Include relevant rather than superficial truths because the information has far more value. Information that cannot be ascertained should be credited to the reporter, e.g., "An uncle passed on the rumor." "this information has never been officially verified. " "It was suspected, but never proven, that . . ."

Carefully re-read all first drafts for accuracy like a detective questioning people, dates, and places for truthfulness. List all sources for information verification and note where reference credit is due. Use endnotes or have source referencing contained in your reported material.

Looking at the when and where. If your father was too young for the Vietnam War or your grandmother didn't own a computer, you can infer that Dad didn't serve in Southeast Asia in the 60's, and Grandma wasn't computer literate. It's quite all right to use generalities like these to emphasize specifics.

Use intuition. You can often assume a consistent pattern of behavior or your own feel for family genes when trying to figure out how an ancestor may have reacted to a frightening incident, like facing a gun held by a bank robber. How did Dad react when he was fired from a construction job? What would Mom have done when a teacher told her you were incorrigible? What kind of lures would your older brother have used when fishing? Would Mom have cooked ham or turkey for Thanksgiving? Go with the previous flow or your own gut reaction.

When does truth telling become true confessions? There may be occasions when you worry about the confidentiality of information you are studying or relating. Should you protect the memory of a wrongdoing or not cast unfavorable impressions on a character you are including in your writing?

Try the following justifications:

· when withholding information alters the story significantly

· when you go too far to justify an action which favors one person over another

· when the information is uncomfortable (this can be almost anything, verbal or physical abuse, an    unpublished criminal action)

· a private suspicion (e.g., homosexuality, alcoholism, drug addiction, a character flaw)

· trust of your source

What approach do you use when recreating truth in a story? You have many tools available to you. You can use third person narration, dialogue, character brainwave reading, or fiction techniques. Being thrown out of school was the most devastating occurrence in your mother's life and affected many of her later experiences and relationships. Assume you're recreating a conversation between your mother as a young girl and her best friend. They've organized a trap for their hated sixth grade teacher to smear her reputation and force her dismissal. You write a rough draft introduction, place, time, characters, clothing, situation, and so forth. Rather than providing your characters with quoted dialogue, you choose to use indirect discourse, i.e., she said that . . . . . . he probably nodded agreement, one would assume that . . . You try to create a picture that your reader will look at objectively rather than become involved in as one would in direct dialogue, i.e., Looking at him sensually, with tongue paused on her upper lip, she whispered tenderly, "I've been waiting for this for a long time." Lifting the wing of his right collar and beginning to unravel his tie, he answered softly, "So have I."

TYPES OF LIFE WRITING

Life writing can take many forms:

· straight chronologies - from beginning to end
· chronologies with sidebars - intermixing stories with offshoot occurrences
· plotted chronologies - hurrying, slowing, or excluding time periods
· visualized situations - recreating hearsay
· providing themes - interweaving a desired trait such as unselfishness through
  several members of your family
· using myths - rumors, fourth and fifth-handed stories, unreliable sources

In straight chronologies, one narrates dates and facts: births, marriages, school graduations, deaths, and other validated accomplishments. This is a legitimate means of life recognition and sharing family history. However, when you leave out the why and how, you're avoiding life writing. You just have a lot of statistics.

With sidebars, you're able to add action or further corroboration, such as who was present at your sister's birth in an automobile because your mother couldn't make it to the hospital, how did your five brothers and sisters react to the birth, or why was the baby named Tondolea Fink Jones?
Using causes and effects can provide a very dull story with emotions and tension.

The unfaithful antiquated battered automobile with its various ills of poor brakes, a tentative transmission, no horn, an unreliable battery, holes in the radiator, tattered tires and driven by an always nattily dressed, over efficient nurse, who always wore immaculate white outfits and knew nothing about either cars or sick people could make an hilarious and suspenseful story.

Life writing is best when the writer moves from what to why and how. All of us are motivated by different influences and our methods of performing tasks, how we eat a hamburger or drive a car. There are certain favored, prized items that a family will always carry from one home to the next. Why? How is that item's safe condition guaranteed? Insights need to be written as the reasons your characters are influenced by specific factors or experiences and why they might act in certain ways in different situations. Does your sister jump up on a chair if you yell, "Mouse!"? Does your father light a cigarette when he's nervous? Whys provide meaning. How's provide method, technique, habit, and type. Use your memory jogs and visualization to create new patterns of lifestyles or tendencies of your characters.

USING THEMES IN LIFE WRITING

Most often, themes can lead you in the right direction. The message you want to portray - the goodness of your mother, the meanness of the kid across the street, the great loss which death brings - most of the time, is a result of the method you use in writing. Themes give life, spirit, justification, and purpose to life writing. Themes are what influence your plot the most. Your settings, characters, and plot all point towards a climax and a resolution.

Let's look at the following example: father loses job, family suffers, and father takes a truck driver training course. Voile', a new job! Everybody's happy. Your theme is that your father could bounce back from anything. If your theme is that Father was an heroic type, provide your reader with at least three examples of heroic events. Also, be very careful not to tell your readers that a certain act was heroic. Let the action itself show the heroism. If your mother was a frustrated actress, describe several examples of this frustration.

Inherited themes are the "residue" of an earlier society's supposed "wisdom." Slavery, intolerance, religious persecution, management by harassment - all are examples of previously held societal views. Memories, like sources, become older and less reliable with time. Sometimes they are lengthened rather than shortened. That's another good reason you should record your own memories as they actually happened. One good practical exercise is to give the inherited theme to its rightful owner and move on to your own beliefs. If Uncle Joe thought booze was the only way to relieve stress that was his world, not yours.

Myths are fantasies, assumptions, or even philosophies about people, history, religion, or whatever. Jungian theory, in fact, divides people into archetypes, just as current management theorists separate managers into ". . . those who make it happen," ". . .those who watch," and ". . . those who don't know what's happening." Martyrs, bleeding hearts, and ministers are all givers. Mafia members, street beggars, and slick marketers are all takers. Republicans are conservative; Democrats are liberals. In life writing, the writer must be selective. Separate myths from realities or feasible happenings. Move from meaning to myth, rather than vice versa.

Don't preach. Teachers and preachers tend to endorse their own themes, messages, and points of view. Remain objective, using the subjective only when interpretation provides better understanding of a situation, action, or relationship between your characters. Tell the story, don't interpret it. If your reader's eyes start to glaze, you're not getting the message across.

Unit 5 Questions

1. Why are exact dates and facts important in life writing?

2. What does "intuition" mean?

3. Name two instances when you can withdraw "truth" from your life writing?

4. Name three different types of life writing?

5. Which do you prefer and why?

6. What does "theme" mean?

7. What is a "myth"?

Send a copy of your answers as an attachment to an E-mail addressed to your mentor.

HOMEWORK

Please send each homework submittal as an attachment to an E-mail addressed to your mentor.

1. Complete your daily journal entries.

2. In your journal, write notes about each of the ten key life experiences you have listed.

3. Prepare prewriting materials and write three drafts of a three-paragraph essay on a unique or unforgettable relative or person you have known in your past. E-mail a copy to your mentor.