Switching gears to another polemic

It was another big day for fraudulent memoirs.

I find it so interesting that authors keep lying about their real lives when they could just write fiction. Is there a huge difference between saying “I lived with a pack of wolves” or “I was a teenage drug pusher,” and “Jane Eyre lived with a pack of drug-addicted wolves”?

The fabricated memoir trend resembles the reality TV trend (can trends last a decade?). In reality TV, actual people become actors. The audience demands overweening drama. We* want reality to seem like the movies. And everything on the small screen is more compelling when it’s staged as “reality.” We are complicit in the lie, and yet we’re furious when we find out that the apparent spontaneity of reality TV is actually scripted.


It’s the same thing with these memoirs. Fiction isn’t good enough anymore. We’re addicted to the fantasy of reality. We need actuality to be larger than life, and we need a reminder that our small, insignificant bodies can be epic in stature. But shame on the author whom we catch making something up.

The naive writers who fabricate their memoirs need to realize that real life, with all its flaws and dull moments, is infinitely more interesting than their fictional-nonfiction, even if their phony sagas involve inner city gang warfare. That’s why someone else always ends up writing brilliantly about how and why the author lied in the first place. And that book or article will probably be read more than the fake memoir. Just like reality TV blogs are better than the actual shows. Just like my blog is better than everyone else’s. Why isn’t everyone reading my blog?

*To be honest I’m not sure who “we” represents here. I picture a La-Z-Boy and a bowl of snacks. Maybe some Velvet Art on the walls. I’m sitting in Joe America’s lap, and we’re watching reruns of The Simple Life.

One Thought on “Switching gears to another polemic

  1. baconfat on March 5, 2008 at 10:50 am said:

    i’m going to write a fake memoir about how i was an original cast member on “the real world – london.” i had a three-way with kat and jacinda and broke their hearts, then i got into a violent altercation with neil the punk rocker. as a result of the trouble i caused, my role on the show was completely erased and i was replaced by mike the race car driver. they were expecting me to be like puck, but i ended up being much scarier, nay realer than that.

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