Because it's a holiday - or perhaps just because - I'm taking a break from WWI and reading the new bio of Martha Gellhorn.
It's not the book I should have written, thank God. (When Brian originally pointed out the review of this book in the newspaper last fall, I almost cried, for the work I haven't done.) What it IS is a meticulously researched yet still highly readable portrait of a not terribly likeable woman.
I'm not sure I could write biography. One the one hand, you have to be objective and avoid romanticizing your subject or rationalizing his/her behavior. On the other hand, I think you really have to LIKE your subject and feel sympathy for him/her. That makes your portrait unique and artistic, rather than a dry recitation of facts that any good researcher could find and organize. I suppose it's the same thing they advise about fiction: your readers WANT to like the characters; give them some reasons to do so.
If I am going to rewrite my essay on Gellhorn, I need to be clearer about the reasons for selecting such a narrow (chronologically) body of work. I chose it because I thought it was the best of her work - but what does "best" mean? What are my implicit criteria? Then, what are the theoretical underpinnings of my dimly perceived connection between reportage and fiction? If lived life is the grist of the fiction mill, how does the grinding process work? How have scholars theorized it? Then last, pitching this work semi-commercially implies a different introduction than what one would write for a journal. It has to introduce, to be highly readable, not too extra-referential.
The experiential plays into it, so my planned reading of Tuan - and wherever that leads, probably back to phenomenology, which ties possibly to thing-theory (more of that anon) - is right on target. Although - this may be one of those cases in which, if you are a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Everything is experiential and about things, yes?
Posted by otto0114 at May 31, 2004 10:41 AM