James Frey, Non-Fiction and the New Age
I received multiple Publishers Weekly announcements in my e-mail today, describing the debacle that was taking place live on Oprah. James Frey with his publisher, Nan Talese, was being confronted for fictionalizing parts of his non-fiction "memoir" by Oprah and a few invited journalists, including one of my favorites - Maureen Dowd.
Let's face it - no one likes being fooled. Oprah, who can turn a book into an instant best seller, was incensed, and rightfully so. I'm sure that publishers around the country, if not the world, are taking notice. The due diligence of fact-checking that should be exacted by every publisher when it comes to a non-fiction work is a non-negotiable requirement.
So what does this mean for New Age publishers and authors? We write non-fiction books. Some write spell books for those who want to find their heart's desire. Others detail the magical traditions of secret societies. A few authors claim to have ancient lineages or other esoteric credentials. Don't each of us have a responsibility to those who read our work, to represent ourselves in truth? Yet so many authors write without regard to that most basic premise. This, to me, is one of occult publishing's dirty little secrets. As an industry, and as individual writers, we should re-commit ourselves to ensuring that our non-fiction work is genuinely non-fiction.
Let's face it - no one likes being fooled. Oprah, who can turn a book into an instant best seller, was incensed, and rightfully so. I'm sure that publishers around the country, if not the world, are taking notice. The due diligence of fact-checking that should be exacted by every publisher when it comes to a non-fiction work is a non-negotiable requirement.
So what does this mean for New Age publishers and authors? We write non-fiction books. Some write spell books for those who want to find their heart's desire. Others detail the magical traditions of secret societies. A few authors claim to have ancient lineages or other esoteric credentials. Don't each of us have a responsibility to those who read our work, to represent ourselves in truth? Yet so many authors write without regard to that most basic premise. This, to me, is one of occult publishing's dirty little secrets. As an industry, and as individual writers, we should re-commit ourselves to ensuring that our non-fiction work is genuinely non-fiction.
posted by Caelum Rainieri at 5:14 PM
3 Comments:
Back in the early 1990s when I edited Llewellyn's Witchcraft Today series, I made two editorial rules. The phrases "It is said that ..." and "Legend has it..." were absolutely forbidden. I think that these rules forced the contributors to be a bit more clear about who they were. Certainly we got some good writing, even though reviewers often mis-categorized it as "advanced."
Excellent advice, Chas. Those two simple rules should be iron-clad and applied across the industry.
Personally, I would like to see some credible referencing and bibliographies. From the "look" of most "new age" books, one would think that the author invented - er channeled - most/all of what s/he knows/writes. Especially true of the most well known. Carolyn Myss and Liz Greene come to mind as rather good examples of this.
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