Philosophy of Fiction

Fiction is a renewable new—an actual rerun.

Fiction is neither real nor fantasy but surreal and traditional. Fiction is at once overwhelming and underwhelming; it is in opposition with itself.

Fiction is a place you can return to. Fiction always feels like the first time.

Fiction is schizophrenic, repetitive, schizophrenic repetitive, ticked off and compulsive.

Fiction is not so much a nominalization as it is a thing. It never was a verb. Fiction is not an act nor is it acting. Fiction cries, “Action!” (not “Cut!” and definitely not “Print!”) It directs. It plots. It plays games and changes the rules mid-game.

Fiction is a bad cheat with a bad temper. It has no poker face.

Fiction is not new wave, no wave, synth-pop, country, r&b. It has no flava.

Fiction is a punk who loves jazz. A quagmire; a total wreck. Like Mingus wielding his rifle in a run-down loft the night before he is evicted, fiction creates theories of conspiracy in front of documentary cameras. Only, the conspiracies come true.

Fiction is a self-wish-fulfill-er.

Fiction lumbers, doesn’t dance.

Fiction is genius—the genius of “the place.” It refuses to wear a guise other than itself. Fiction is here and elsewhere.

Folks know fiction when they see it but leave it well enough alone. Fiction is a hearty “So’s your old man!” An “I can do it, too.”—better than you, better next time.

Fiction always works on itself. Always revises.

Fiction does not fast: is not sober: reads anything: does not limit itself to one “look.” Fiction looks and is never bored at what it reads.

Fiction has body image issues. Fiction does not like what it sees in the mirror: is guilty, self-indulgent: gorges, often, on the details of everyday life only to purge itself of the minutia in overlong sentences that tickle and tease their way forth in awful impatient heaves leaving gaze, reflection, and criticism-before-the-fact on the floor.

Fiction is a long time coming.

Fiction is moody.

But Fiction swings. Both ways. No shit.