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On Fact and Fiction

Writer's picture: Adrian J. BoasAdrian J. Boas

Academics occasionally write works of fiction, but most often these works are stillborn. Their ill-fated destiny is to be forgotten in a desk drawer under a pile of papers and a fine layer of dust, or, to use a more up-to-date image, in a disregarded computer file or the recycle bin. No doubt, in many cases, this is a good thing. The ability to write an erudite paper on a problem of astrophysics or on an event in eighteenth century Chinese history, does not necessarily endow the scholar with an equal aptitude in conjuring up believable invented characters, imagined settings, made-up plots, and fanciful dialogue. And if the said scholar does in fact possess the ability to do these things, and has the desire to do so, and indeed, for his own pleasure goes ahead and writes the novel, he is generally reluctant to ‘contaminate’ (too strong a word perhaps) his academic output by actually publishing it.


The urge to use what in the academic world is something of an atrophied muscle – imagination – is generally, by necessity, suppressed. This is, of course, completely understandable. If I am accustomed to write about a fortress that I have studied, basing my writing solely on factual evidence, might I not put all that I have done at risk by writing about that same fortress and introducing into it people and events that have no actual foundation?


This is the dilemma that faced me when I wrote my first novel and set it in the very castle that I had studied and always taken care to write about only on the basis of verified facts. Was I not, by doing this, placing doubt over all my previous work? Indeed, it was suggested to me that I should put this new book aside, at least until after I retired (which is what I did).


The need to keep academic writing separate from works of fiction is entirely understandable. It would hardly do if we were to pick up an academic book or a paper in an academic journal and need to wonder how much of the content was fact or even theory, and how much was purely the writer's imagination. If there were to be no distinction, if works of history or science were to be tainted by invented material, would they not lose their usefulness altogether and become mere extensions of fiction? (Might not one then legitimately ask to what extent the recent volcanic eruptions on the moon, discussed in a paper published in Science.org, would affect the taste of the green cheese?) It is true that Herodotus and other early historians used imaginary dialogue to bring their histories alive, and modern writers of autobiography, a class of writing that certainly should be more rigorous in its accuracy, sometimes do the same, with the author recalling with remarkable and hardly credible recollection, word for word conversations that he had overheard or participated in at the age of six.


This is not to say that academics do not need imagination. It is my firm belief that they do. Without imagination, one is limited in what one can theorise about, and theory is a legitimate part of any scholarly work. When I was excavating a completely dismantled Templar fortress above the Jordan River, perhaps under the influence of mid-day summer heat and humidity, I occasionally found myself imagining, almost seeing and hearing, the army of Saladin moving along the fields below, just across the river. In my mind I could hear the whoosh of the surge of arrows released, and the shouts and drumming, and I could feel the tension within our walls (Being within the castle, I naturally identified with the Templars rather than the Ayyubids. Had I been excavating outside the fortress, like Isaac Rosenberg’s cosmopolitan rat my sympathies would no doubt have been reversed). I could see how the enemy moved, and conclude where he would likely attack. This imaginary spectacle aided me in understanding the passage of events that took place at Jacob’s Ford (the name of the castle) in the last week of August 1179, even if, in my writing, I avoided mention of that vision.

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