Reflection #2

            Fictionalizing an actual event from my life for me was quite a difficult task. I never did anything like this before, and I never really planned to. It was hard when I was trying to turn all of my facts into fiction, because I really didn’t know what to change it into. It made me think quite a bit. Sometimes while I was trying to make the story fiction, I kept trying to hold myself back from taking big steps. Sometimes I would ask myself is this going too far with the fiction, or is there not enough fiction? Usually, I feel like my work is never good enough. Sometimes when I was trying to change the story so that in a way it doesn’t sound like the actual thing that happened to me, I really didn’t want to change anything because I already liked the way it sounded. Sometimes, when people write things and they find that what they wrote is really good, they never really want to let go of what they wrote, and I guess that is how I was. I was extremely possessive with my writing.

            When I was trying to fictionalize my work, it was very difficult for me to part with my original story. I felt as if my original story was really good and it would appeal to whoever wrote my portfolio, but I knew that I had to completely make it fiction because that was the assignment. Sometimes, when someone writes something, that person may cradle it like a baby. They love what they wrote so much that they never want to let go. That’s exactly how I felt with my writing. In Sue Miller’s Essay “Virtual Reality: The Perils of Seeking a Novelist’s Facts in Her Fiction”, Miller speaks about a quote she always talks about when people ask her a certain question. The quote speaks about how attached people can be to the facts in their fiction:

“The role autobiography plays in fiction is like that of reality to a dream. As you dream your ship, you perhaps know the boat, but you’re going towards a coast that is quite strange; you’re wearing strange clothes, the language being spoken around you is a language you don’t understand, but the woman on the left is your wife.” (Miller 156)

This quote is speaking about how an autobiography can be similar like a reality to a dream. It’s basically saying that when you first produce your ideas for a non-fiction story turned fiction, you know all the details because it’s your own story and no one can alter it. But later on, when you’re trying to change your story into a completely different story that is fiction, it becomes difficult but a good experience. Your mind goes into many different places, and you begin to attain so many different ideas. Sometimes it can be hard to keep up, and your imagination is just running wild. Some things you might not want to let go of, but you must. But your story, which is mentioned in the quote as a “wife” will always be beside you, and you can never fully let go of it. I really like this quote because it gives a great explanation explaining how difficult it can be to let go of your own stories, but then finally you let go, but you always know that the story is always beside you.

            I believe that a part of you must always be a part of your work. If it’s not, technically it can’t really be your work because you have basically taken out everything that is yours, and that’s not a good thing. Your own work should display your individuality, and how creative you should be. Even if you’re taking a true story and turning it into fiction, you shouldn’t completely change it. You should leave some true things in there. When you’re still involved in your work, it can take you to another place, even if you’re going through something difficult, such as Alice Hoffman, the author of the essay “Sustained by Fiction While Facing Life’s Facts.” Hoffman is a writer going through a difficult time in her life. Many of her family members were very ill, and on the verge of death. All of a sudden after doing a book tour and achieving fame with her book, she was diagnosed with breast cancer, and it seemed like her world just turned upside down.  Although she was going through a time of sadness and despair, she finally found beauty and happiness in her writing, and it helped her do what she really wanted. She wanted to be free from all the pain and sadness so she wrote. In her essay, she writes about what writing did for her through her hard times:

“I wrote to find beauty and purpose, to know that love is possible and lasting and real, to see daylilies and swimming pools, loyalty, and devotion, even though my eyes were closed and all that surrounded me was a darkened room. I wrote because that was who I was at the core, and if I was too damaged to walk around the block, I was lucky all the same. Once I got to my desk, once I started writing, I still believed anything was possible.” (Hoffman 98)

This quote speaks about how Hoffman found beauty and escapes from her sadness with writing. She learned so many things through just writing, and it provided her a place of happiness. She kept herself in her writing, and it made her very happy in her life, even though her life wasn’t that great. That is a reason why one should always stay within their writing. Writing helps to soothe the mind, and helps people escape such a harsh world. It helps people to be happy, even when times are sad. It has helped me many times when I was feeling upset. I just let out all my feelings on paper, and sometimes, those feelings disappear from my body. I just feel like I got many things off of my chest that really needed to be taken off of my chest. Being in your writing may help you in life, whatever the situation.

Works Cited

1) Miller, Sue. "Virtual Reality." Writers on Writing. 156.

                   Print.


2)Hoffman, Alice. "Sustained by Fiction While 

                  Facing Life’s Facts." Writers on Writing. 98. 
                  Print.