If you have been following this blog and its predecessor, you will see reviews of books from a variety of genres – both fiction and non-fiction. However, a closer look at the book lists will reveal an interesting trend. When I began my reading with a renewed sense of earnestness, I preferentially prioritized non-fiction books with the thought that I wanted to maximize the learning impact of each book. My goal at the time was to become smart on particular topics; to really know why I held the positions that I held or learn about subjects where I was deficient. I wanted to be able engage in conversation or debate on a topic and be guaranteed that I would be more well read and knowledgeable about the subject at hand.
My initial thought about fiction was that it served as a distraction from the information that I was able to glean from non-fiction works. Stated more simply, it took time away from reading other books. However, over the years, as I have grown and matured, I have begun incorporating fiction into my reading lists. Here are several reasons why I now consider fictional works hold a valuable place in my library.
Great works of literature are fiction
This one may seem simple on its face, but a compelling reason to read fiction is that there are many great works of literature (written by historical and contemporary authors) that are fiction. To ignore these would be to miss a large number of classic pieces of literature. To various degrees this canon is the foundation to our society and western culture. It is a common language. It serves as a shared cultural foundation.
I am sure that you have had the experience of interacting with others and referencing movies. “Talk to me, Goose!” Are you going to take the red pill or blue pill? “He’s only mostly dead.” Did the top tip? We all resonate with the maturation and struggles of Harry Potter, the tension that pulls Luke between good or evil uses of the force, Frodo’s temptation to give up when the going gets tough all the while realizing that the fate of all middle earth depends on the destruction of a single gold ring. These and many more are common, shared cinematic experiences, and they serve as a foundational and common cultural element. Fictional literature plays a similar role, but with a greater depth of historical context.
Fiction is a compelling way to discuss hard truths
Have you ever noticed that there are times when you need to say something that is hard? Or turn it around, has there ever been a time when you have needed to be the recipient of some hard information – particularly a critique requiring change? If we are truly honest, we would have to admit that it initially doesn’t go very well. We don’t like to be challenged. We don’t like to be told that we are wrong. When this happens, we put up our defenses and prepare for battle.
While this may reveal particular issues of pride and teachability in our own hearts, we do have a natural ability to resist confrontation. Fiction is a great way to discuss hard truths. Story has a way of infiltrating our defenses. Think about the prophet Nathan confronting King David. He used story to convict the heart of the king. The separation provided by an artificial reality is just disarming enough to allow us to hear and receive hard truths. After all, what is being conveyed is being said to somebody else and not us. It is easier to hear, receive, and respond to hard truths when we are not directly in the crosshairs.
Fiction is a laboratory of life
Reading in general is a great way to leverage other people’s ideas, wisdom, and experiences in your own pursuit of excellence. I want to learn about personal finance, so I find a book by a person experienced in personal finance and benefit from their knowledge conveyed to me. I want to learn more about parenting, so I read a book by someone who has successfully raised kids.
Fiction, though disguised in narrative accomplishes the same thing. By reading stories, you can explore a variety of life situations that you have not yet personally experienced. You get to see various scenarios that have not previously happened, but could. You can see how the characters responded. Did they make the right choice? Did they make the wrong choice? What happened? What would things be like if an apocalyptic disaster happened (The Road, Cormack McCarthy). What geopolitical complications could happen between competing nations (Never, Ken Fowlett). Is an opulent lifestyle as satisfying as it seems (The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald)?
In medicine we train by doing simulations. These fictional, yet plausible, cases give us an opportunity to practice assessing and managing a patient all while evaluating our knowledge and exposing knowledge gaps. Similarly, with fiction, we can watch scenarios unfold, observe how the characters act, and witness the consequences of these actions. And for the really savvy consumer of fiction, you can insert yourself into the story and ask yourself how you would act in that situation. Fiction requires a certain exercise of imagination that translates into imaginative skills that we can use to react and adapt to various life circumstances and scenarios. Without realizing it, by reading fiction, you are motivating yourself and equipping yourself for a life of excellence.
Explore unknown worlds
Fiction gives us an opportunity to use out imagination. Through fiction we can re-live past or known events in a way that brings that history to life. Dickens reminds us about life during the French Revolution (A Tale of Two Cities). Pressfield allows us to march with the Spartans to Thermopylae as they defend against the Persians (Gates of Fire).
Fiction is not limited, though, to adding color to history. Like the explorers of previous times, fiction can create and allow us to explore new and never previously known. Our imagination, combined with that of the author, can unlock great epochs and grand vistas. Lewis transports us to the magical land of Narnia. Tolkein brings us to middle earth.
This latter aspect of exploring new worlds is of particular interest. There is something in us that recognizes our presence in this world but is always seeking another – one that is just a little more perfect. It is hard to watch the Lord of the Rings Trilogy and not wish that we lived in Rivendell.
C.S. Lewis writes in the Weight of Glory that we are made for heaven. “Now, if we are made for heaven, the desire for our proper place will be already in us, but not yet attached to the true object, and will appear as the rival of that object.” We live in this world, but we long for a world that is perfect – one that is to come. We long to create and enjoy images of that reality. We long for heaven.
Lewis continues,
Apparently, then, our lifelong nostalgia, our longing to be reunited with something in the universe from which we now feel cut off, to be on the inside of some door which we have always seen from the outside, is no neurotic fancy, but the truest index of our real situation… We do not want merely to see beauty, though, God knows, even that is beauty enough. We want something else which can hardly be put into words – to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it. That is why we have peopled air and earth and water with gods and goddesses and nymphs and elves – that, though we cannot, yet these projections can enjoy in themselves that beauty, grace, and power of which nature is the image.
We find ourselves on this side of the door longing to peer through a window – to glimpse and enjoy true utopian beauty - heaven. Fiction is a way of communicating about that world and the idea of it. It is a way of saying that there is more than merely the things that we see, touch, taste, hear and smell. We long for our eternal home.
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