Wednesday, April 18, 2012

False Mastery of Information



You will agree with me that when you read a book, an essay or research paper on a certain topic, somehow you always imagine that the writer is a professional in that field (that he is writing about). It may be true in some cases, but in most cases that is not always the case. A writer may be prolific in writing about a certain thing-this is mostly common among UK writers who are employed in the media houses-but in reality they may not uphold the same or worse still may not know so much about the topic in question other than the face value of it.

A good example is when an author writes about experiences of war in the first person as though he was actually on the ground as an army officer or soldier when the war was on. People reading the story may be captivated by the story (which is alright as it is the primary target of the writers), but they may also associate the writers with the story and imagine that it is indeed true that the writers know so much about war. From my research this is not true at all because as much as the writers present themselves as the know-alls, the reality is a different scenario altogether. Jeffrey Archer has written many Crime thrillers, but it remains to be seen if he can marshal a troop of soldiers into war.  

False Image


If there is something that fiction writers never fail to serve their readers wholeheartedly is the false image they present to them. It is unheard of for a writer to write something from the blues in the sense that he or she writes things he or she can’t identify with. In most cases, writers will put down a story that happened in their surroundings or important still in their own lives (except of course writers who write research papers and book reports). It is the latter probability rather than the former that causes people to develop false images or develop funny impressions about the real identities of the writers in question.
It is very hard for most people to differentiate between the real life of people and what they put down as a piece of literature. Essentially, most people like drawing parallels between the two scenarios but I couldn’t differ more. My research has shown me beyond reasonable doubt that what UK writers put down is very different from who they actually are. The false image readers have of their writers is just that: a false image borne in the mind and whose existence is in the mind. Nonetheless, there are some writers like Jack Higgins who maintain a nice image both in their books and in real life.