postex

I forget who said it, but someone influential and successful said that they learn more about the truth from novels than from non-fiction books. I like that idea but I don't think it fully defines the novel or literature. 

There's been a growing realization as well, that what we call non-fiction has a considerable degree of fictiveness about it. It's understood that information and ideas can be represented in different ways and the most effective way to do so is to embody them in stories.