CREATIVE NONFICTION

Creative nonfiction is nonfiction prose which utilizes the techniques and strategies of fiction.

Creative nonfiction combines the authority of literature and the authority of fact. It demands spontaneity and an imaginative approach, while remaining true to the validity and integrity of the information it contains.

Creative nonfiction differs from fiction because it is necessarily and scrupulously accurate in the presentation of information, a teaching element to the readers, is paramount.

Creative nonfiction differs from traditional reportage, however, because balance is unnecessary and subjectivity is not only permitted but encouraged. (The Art of Creative Nonfiction (1997), Gutkind)

This genre is used to be called personal journalism or literary journalism or new journalism or parajournalism. These days it is labeled “creative nonfiction.”

According to Theodore A. Rees Cheney, “Creative nonfiction requires the skill of the storyteller and the research ability of the reporter” (1991).

This type of writing, begins with the facts, but does much more. It elaborates on the facts, interprets them, and, more significantly, presents them in an interesting and engaging way.

It is a “more imaginative approach to reporting” Or, put in another way, it is “fact-based writing that remains compelling, undiminished by the passage of time, that has at heart an interest in enduring human values: foremost a fidelity to accuracy, to truthfulness (Forche and Gerard 2001,1)

The key word is “personal.” The writer of creative nonfiction presents the world – or that slice of it that he wishes to focus on – through the prism of his own personality. Thus he makes contact with the reader in a different way from that of the traditional journalist. The reader becomes involved, as he does in fiction. He gets to know the personalities, gets caught up in the events.

from Creative Nonfiction: Manual for Filipino Readers by Cristina Pantoja Hidalgo, UP Press

Storm Dante's 'Peak'

Tropical storm Dante derailed our supposed make-up class last Sunday, May 3.

I will try to upload the lessons that should have been covered on that session.

Be guided.

Thank you.