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FACT AND FICTION: A PARTNERSHIP IN COMPOSITION
Abstract
"The pen is mightier than the sword" only so long as the penman is at least as adept as the swordsman. A teacher of composition should, first of all, be a competent writer. This implies that he must be able, in any circumstance, to write convincingly and winningly. He must learn to call on experience at least as often as on research, to furnish credibility to his products. And he must rely on imagination to insure their interest value. Credibility is a likely effect of a continued practice of capturing on paper memories of one's own past. Imagination is sharpened by the habit of fictionalizing or fantasizing. The two rewarding techniques can be usefully combined. Both attract the incentive of student writers and are within their easy reach. And incentive promotes a class's best efforts. This dissertation is an exercise in creative writing, demonstrating the ring of authenticity and the flare of pleasure that can be produced by a careful alliance of the story-teller's art with memories born of experience. The five stories that comprise the main body of text were written over a two-year period and concern a time span ranging from 1927 to about 1975. The subjects of their plots involve the following: war within a war, Europe 1944-5; suicide on a freighter voyage; intrigues of a conniving miss on a cavalry post; small white boy and black orderly, kindred spirits in rebellion; missionary's faith is tested and destroyed. Though the stories rise out of a variety of settings, an educated imagination can equip a single setting with stimulating variety. A partnership of fact and fiction, exemplified in the stories, is a desirable skill to be cultivated in the education of a writer.
Subject Area
American literature
Recommended Citation
PICKETT, CLYDE, "FACT AND FICTION: A PARTNERSHIP IN COMPOSITION" (1982). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI8227035.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI8227035