Take a vow of chastity

If you write non-fiction using the techniques of fiction you need to know where to draw the line. Roy Peter Clark, who has taught writing for 30 years, begs you to take his vow of chastity.

I've broken some of these rules, and would again, but they are excellent reminders.

 1. Any degree of fabrication turns a story from non-fictionin to fiction, which must be labeled as such. (A person cannot be a little pregnant, nor a story a little fictional.)

2. The writer, by definition, may distort reality by subtraction (the way a photo is cropped), but is never allowed to distort by adding material to non- fiction that the writer knows did not happen.

3. Characters that appear in non-fiction must be real individuals, not composites drawn from a number of persons. While there are occasions when characters can or should not be named, giving characters fake names is not permitted. (They can be identified by an initial, a natural status “The Tall Woman,” or a role “The Accountant.”)

4. Writers of non-fiction should not expand or contract time or space for narrative efficiency. (Ten conversations with a source that took place in three locations cannot be merged into a single conversation in a single location.)

5. Invented dialogue is not permitted. Any words in quotations marks must be the result of a) written documents such as trial transcripts, or b) words recorded directly by the writer or some other reliable source. Remembered conversations — especially from the distant past — should be rendered with another form of simple punctuation, such as indented dashes: — like this –.

6. We reject the notion in all of literature of a “higher truth,” a phrase that has been used too often as a rationalization in non-fiction for making things up. It is hard enough, and good enough, to attempt to render a set of “practical truths.”

7. Aesthetic considerations must be subordinated — if necessary — to documentary discipline.

8. Non-fiction does not result from a purely scientific method, but responsible writers will inform audiences on both what they know and how they know it. The sourcing in a book or story should be sufficient so that another reporter or researcher or fact-checker, acting in good faith, could follow the tracks of the original reporter and find comparable results.

9. Unless working in fantasy, science fiction, or obvious satire, all writers, including novelists and poets, have an affirmative duty to render the world accurately through their own research and detective work. (The poet should not create a piano with 87 keys unless intending a specific effect.)

10. The escape clause: There may be occasions, when the writer can think of no other way to tell a story than through the use of one or more of these “banned” techniques. The burden is on the writer to demonstrate that this is so. To keep faith with the reader, the writer should become transparent concerning narrative methods. A detailed note to readers should appear AT THE BEGINNING OF THE WORK to alert them of the standards and practices of the writer.