From: lydick@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU (Speaker-to-Minerals)
Subject: Re: Responsibilities of Artists (was Re: Pornography and Playboy)
Reply-To: lydick@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU
Organization: HST Wide Field/Planetary Camera
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 09:51:16 GMT

In article <1992Jul27.030034.20562@midway.uchicago.edu>, mss2@quads.uchicago.edu (Michael S. Schiffer) writes:
>In article <1992Jul27.004705.17211@midway.uchicago.edu> kwhyte@dent.uchicago.edu (Kevin Whyte) writes:
>>  I didn't really mean to include delibrate lying, I was mostly 
>>responding to your statement about writing KKK propaganda being 
>>evil.  Much as with anything else, it is possible to cause harm
>>by trying to convince people of something, if harm is your intent.
>
>	"But my point is that portraying something one disbelieves as
>true _is_ lying.

But is lying in that sense always bad.  Remember Harlan Ellison's (I think it
was H.E., though I'm not sure) description of science fiction writers: 
Professional liars.  It's the job of writers of fiction to do their best to
portray something they disbelieve as true, to the best of their ability.  They
assume, of course, that the context in which their work appears will allow any
reader with any sense at all to figure out that it's a work of fiction; but to
the extent that a work of fiction is OBVIOUSLY a work of fiction, the writer
has failed (for the most part;  there are [relatively rare] circumstances in
which the work of fiction's effect depends heavily upon the fact that the
reader is acutely aware throughout that he's reading a work of fiction.  For
examples, see the work of [if I remember correctly] C.L. Moore and Henry
Cutler).

>What's the difference between making up facts and
>making up other truths?  Is it any less a lie to write a story which
>states that unprovoked cruelty is honorable (assuming the writer
>doesn't believe this to be true) than to write a work which states, as
>fact, that Beethoven was actually a Buddhist monk?"

Is it any less a lie to make up a story which states that there is (or was [or
will be]) a planet called Trantor which is entirely covered by man-made
artifacts?

>>  Mostly I'm trying to say that I see nothing wrong with art which
>>conveys/explores ideas that the artist finds distasteful.  Art 
>>which allows you to understand, sympathize with, and (temporarily) believe
>>someone foreign to you is, I think, a good thing.
>
>	"Conveying and exploring are two different things, while
>portraying something as praiseworthy is still a third.  And I
>think there's a significant difference between a work which bears the
>theme "Had I been subjected to the influences depicted, I too might
>have become a Nazi camp guard" and one which suggests, "It would have
>been glorious to have been a Nazi camp guard, had I only lived at the
>right time."

But to the extent that the latter is distinguishable from either of the former,
it loses a lot of its effectiveness.  A reader of a work of fiction per force
experiences whatever's portrayed at least second-hand.  By restricting the
fiction to the first two categories, you're relegating the closest possible
experience to third-hand.

>>A character study
>>which allowed people to understand at a gut level how and why people 
>>can commit acts that seem unimaginable is a powerful tool for understanding.
>>People (hopefully) are capable of thinking about what they see, rather
>>than just believing it.  If the audience is small children then I might
>>feel differently.
>
>	"Again, I don't think that it's necessary to convey particular
>_acts_ with approval to make it possible to understand how someone
>else can reach that conclusion.

But it IS necessary.  How much distance can you put between a reader and a
character before what you're writing is simply a commentary rather than a work
of art?

>It's very dependent on context.  For
>a crude example, if one's main character is a pre-Civil War
>Southerner, and he launches into a defense of slavery on the basis of
>black inferiority, that's one thing.  It's another thing, though, if
>all the black characters in the tale _are_ clearly mentally inferior,

You're right.  The former isn't very effective at giving the reader an
understanding of the mindset of some southernors, while the latter is.
The former conveys, at best, the mindset of a Yankee who's got some insight
into the mindset of some southernors.  The latter, if done well, gives the
reader a second-hand rather than a third-hand experience.

>if an attempt at schooling black children fails miserably because the
>children are all too stupid to learn, if all the sympathetic black
>characters express love for their master's discipline, while all black
>characters who oppose slavery are little better than wild animals.
>Now, if these events were presented as happening thus, but the whole
>novel were from the slaveowner's point of view (such that _he_ is
>shown to suppose that the school failed because of black inferiority,
>and we see the school only through his eyes) that's quite another
>thing.

What if it's from the point of view of another southernor who doesn't own any
slaves?


>In the first instance (assuming that this isn't an alternate
>history in which Africa held an inferior subspecies of hominids), the
>author is using his omniscience to say something about blacks-- in the
>other he's using it to say something about slaveowners and slavery."

I claim that it's impossible to distinguish the two (unless, of course, the
opus was a work of propaganda rather than a work of art [OK, now everyone gets
to make penguin puns]).

>	"Not that _the_ point of art is to advocate something, but
>that art, by its nature, _does_ say something about the world.  It
>can't avoid it.  Thus, it is not that the "point" of _Romeo and
>Juliet_ was that there is nobility in facing death with bitter mirth,
>but nonetheless, that is what one feels on seeing the death of
>Mercutio-- or the play has failed, in that respect, to have its
>intended effect upon the watcher.  If Shakespeare believed that facing
>death with anything but pious repentence was _wrong_, then he was
>lying to his audience by making Mercutio so likeable and worthy of
>respect."

It sounds to me like you're advocating art as propaganda.  Could Shakespeare
not have believed that facing death with anything but pious repentance was
_wrong_, but beeh honest enough to admit that he, himself, might be in error?
>	"I've seen _9 1/2 Weeks_.

Could you summarize it so that those who've never seen it have a clue as to
what you're talking about?

>(Note that in this context, normal is used to denote
>"typical" rather than "good".)

That's the only reasonable use of the word normal.
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