BY ZOE DOUGLAS-KINGHORN, LEAD WRITER
Our Scribe-winning lead writer rocked up to the Word for Word festival for some serious professional development. Here’s what she learnt about writing and reading nonfiction in Australia.
Last month, I had the sweet luck to attend Word for Word – a national writing festival held in Geelong and celebrating nonfiction.
There are a surprising amount of exciting ideas to think about in the literary realm of nonfiction. Think about the last piece of music you heard or book you read. Did your knowledge of its creator influence your interpretation? Are we sure that Mozart or Bach actually composed all the works under their names? Or that Shakespeare wrote all of the sonnets and plays to which we credit him? Given the sonnets were written or inspired by other people, are they really speaking to Billy’s truth?
Maybe the truth is that the truth is dynamic. Nonfiction is a strange realm encompassing memoir, journalism, essay, and more flexible genres such as creative nonfiction. Thinking about the boundary between facts and stories can lead to questioning, controversy, and harrowing existential dilemmas, such as what is the actual difference between fiction and nonfiction? And is there such a thing as objective truth? Is the truth subjective – and who has the right to write whose story? And, importantly, is it a good idea to bring forest elephants to Europe to bolster their declining African populations?
You decide!
Here are just a few of nuggets of wisdom I learnt at W4W 2018.
1. It’s natural to feel challenged by the creative process.
“There’s always an arc of excruciation and nervous breakdown in creative endeavours where you think you have nothing to say, or that you’re incompetent. This is an essential part of the process; going to hell and back every time.” Thanks, Helen Garner.
2. Writing other people’s stories is sometimes useful, but not always necessary.
Cultural appropriation is using someone else’s cultural background to benefit in some way. Even if you get it right, representing someone whose identity has been marginalised can disadvantage those voices which have traditionally been silenced. Check in and ask yourself whether your writing is harming the culture you are representing. As a writer, you wield a lot of power – and with great power comes great responsibility!
3. The writer’s garret is a myth.
If you’re doing research to back up your nonfiction, you need to talk to people! There are heaps of ways to find out stuff – from archival and internet detective work to interviews, even participatory research. This is where you actually go into the field and experience what it’s like to be there in the situation of your subject.
Note: This does not mean you should risk your life/dignity/sanity for your story. No legal responsibility is taken by CutCommon if you choose to invent a time machine and get stuck in the 18th Century for your thesis.
4. Elephants are diasporic.
According to science writer Tim Flannery, the European continent was not only a hotspot for classical music, but also nurtured many biodiverse evolutionary paths. In fact, many species of elephants developed from mousy-looking European mammals in the prehistoric ages. Controversially, as modern-day European regional townships are returning to the wild, we could potentially introduce species to Eurasia such as the African forest elephant, whose ancestor once roamed its woodlands.
The more you know.
READ NEXT: Did you catch Zoe’s interview with Eddie Ayres about his Word for Word event?
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Zoe Douglas-Kinghorn’s festival attendance was generously supported by Word for Word.
Image supplied.
