James Frey is an Ass
I've been asked so many times about the James Frey disaster that I thought I'd blog about it so I can stop wasting precious brain time answering e-mails about this bozo.
In a nutshell: I think James Frey is an ass.
He lied for money, knowing the more he dramatized his story, the bigger advance he'd get. What he wrote was not memoir, it was standard fiction. All fiction writers base their plots on a blend of interest and experience (write what you know). Frey decided to label his fiction true in order to tap into the red hot memoir market. Unfortunately for all real memoirists, he's sullied the genre as readers grow suspicious of the lot of us.
Now I feel compelled to put my book into perspective. I wrote "Jesus Land" as a tribute to my brother David, and as a way to set the record straight by exposing the hypocrisy of the fundamentalists I grew up with. In my book's case, truth was greater than fiction. No need to embellish it or make up events - they stood on their own.
Perhaps it's my profession as a journalist that makes me so hypersensitive about notions of truth. We journalists know that if you lie, you loose your street cred. The whole point of journalism is to uncover the truth, not to invent it. It's a shame Frey duped so many readers by reinventing himself on paper as such a hero.
Anyway, I hope these will be the last words I ever formulate on the Frey affair. It sickens me, and that's the truth.
In a nutshell: I think James Frey is an ass.
He lied for money, knowing the more he dramatized his story, the bigger advance he'd get. What he wrote was not memoir, it was standard fiction. All fiction writers base their plots on a blend of interest and experience (write what you know). Frey decided to label his fiction true in order to tap into the red hot memoir market. Unfortunately for all real memoirists, he's sullied the genre as readers grow suspicious of the lot of us.
Now I feel compelled to put my book into perspective. I wrote "Jesus Land" as a tribute to my brother David, and as a way to set the record straight by exposing the hypocrisy of the fundamentalists I grew up with. In my book's case, truth was greater than fiction. No need to embellish it or make up events - they stood on their own.
Perhaps it's my profession as a journalist that makes me so hypersensitive about notions of truth. We journalists know that if you lie, you loose your street cred. The whole point of journalism is to uncover the truth, not to invent it. It's a shame Frey duped so many readers by reinventing himself on paper as such a hero.
Anyway, I hope these will be the last words I ever formulate on the Frey affair. It sickens me, and that's the truth.
4 Comments:
First of all, congratulations on the Alex Award! I expect that it will be the recipient of other awards . . . especially if judges enjoy it as much as I did.
Great to hear your frank talk about The Frey Affair! Before I began writing The Scent of God, I asked several great writing friends if I should turn the story into fiction. They told me it had to be nonfiction because, as fiction, it would never be believed.
Like you, I stayed as close to the truth as I could, even in dialogue attempting to recall those conversations as I remember them. We have to rely on memory but I tried to verify as much as I could with others.
Woops, I forgot to add my name. I didn't mean to post an anonymous message.
Hi Beryl, I agree that your story is compelling enough not to embellish. That's the power of memoir. The raw truth, unadorned.
Julia
Thanks for posting on The Ass. I think his public spanking by Oprah and the media was great. The only bad thing is even bad publicity is publicity. The only for sure thing, is I bet he will never write non-fiction again.
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