what happens to its meaning? Is the power sapped, the broth spoiled, fruit from the poisonous tree? Or does it just morph into a different story, real with different truths?
Sarah McGrath, the editor at Riverhead who worked with Ms. Seltzer for three years on the book, said she was stunned to discover that the author had lied.
“It’s very upsetting . . . we completely bought into that and thought we were doing something good by bringing her story to light,” Ms. McGrath said. “There’s a huge personal betrayal here as well as a professional one” . . .
Back when James Frey’s story was abuse-of-belief that fooled even Oprah, I saw its power this way.
Had I known his not-real story had the makings of real social contagion, storytellers one upon another selling whatever people seem to be buying, with whatever false advertising will do the trick, I might have seen it differently? Hmmm, time to think about these new tellings of this same old sad story. And how should we now see the end of the real story, and the believability of their scripted contrition? Doesn’t abuse of story boil down to abuse of our belief in what’s real and what’s not? Read the rest of this entry »
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