USING REAL PEOPLE YOU'VE OBSERVED, MET, OR KNOWN IN FICTION OR NON-FICTION
By Christine Trzyna
Recently a proud poet presented to me and a few other friends a poem she had written about us and grief and loss. For each of us she had taken a bright yellow marker and colored the lines that were about us. She signed it with an artistic flourish in the bottom right hand side of the paper like a painter adding a little hug. She thought she was giving us a gift - empathy.
Being the fastest reader of the group I quickly sensed that my friend Joy was going to be insulted when she read what the poet had written about her. The poet had made an unfortunate word choice, using the word "lost" that made it sound like Joy had her legs amputated when actually she meant to say that Joy had lost the easy use of her legs due to knee injuries. Another woman was upset because her real name was used in a passage about her loss which was the custody of her children.
Situations like this are common within poetry circles and at readings where everyone knows everyone. But using real people you've met, observed or known during your life is literary tradition. Perhaps Truman Capote is now most notorious for having a used a group of society women he called "The Swans," as characters in a novel. They recognized themselves and all but one of them shunned him from that time on. He literally (!) ruined his career as a result.
Why did I use Joy's real name above, when Joy is actually not aware that I blog? Because when I think of Joy I attach to her more closely rather than using the distance of a fake name or alluding to "one." And I think that even the reader who doesn't know anyone named gets a sense about this, that ring of truth that is so important in fiction too.
In my own writing I sometimes struggle with creating a composite character out of a few people I know who are a lot alike in some way, and coming up with fake names that still "fit" a character born of my imagination or based on a live person.
Being the fastest reader of the group I quickly sensed that my friend Joy was going to be insulted when she read what the poet had written about her. The poet had made an unfortunate word choice, using the word "lost" that made it sound like Joy had her legs amputated when actually she meant to say that Joy had lost the easy use of her legs due to knee injuries. Another woman was upset because her real name was used in a passage about her loss which was the custody of her children.
Situations like this are common within poetry circles and at readings where everyone knows everyone. But using real people you've met, observed or known during your life is literary tradition. Perhaps Truman Capote is now most notorious for having a used a group of society women he called "The Swans," as characters in a novel. They recognized themselves and all but one of them shunned him from that time on. He literally (!) ruined his career as a result.
Why did I use Joy's real name above, when Joy is actually not aware that I blog? Because when I think of Joy I attach to her more closely rather than using the distance of a fake name or alluding to "one." And I think that even the reader who doesn't know anyone named gets a sense about this, that ring of truth that is so important in fiction too.
In my own writing I sometimes struggle with creating a composite character out of a few people I know who are a lot alike in some way, and coming up with fake names that still "fit" a character born of my imagination or based on a live person.
