Thursday 26th November

10.30-12.30 pm

(Michael Wilson)

DAY TALK £10.00 PER PERSON

 

Whether to seek fame, to make money, or out of sheer devilment, writers have been lying to us for centuries; women have pretended to be men, young poets have pretended to be medieval; nobodies have pretended to be famous celebrities.

But why do we mind, when novelists lie to us all the time - quite openly feeding us yarns, tall tales and outright improbable porkies? What price Truth? Why do we value it so much in our reading? What do we expect when we read: based on a true story? Is there more then one truth to be told, in some situations?

We will examine a range of infamous hoaxers - from Thomas Chatterton, James McPherson and the entirely imaginary Australian Poet ‘Erne Malley’... to modern writers like Robert Harris (Selling Hitler, a scandal which ruined the cherished reputation of a esteemed academic..), William Boyd (Any Human Heart, Sweet Caress, but especially his biography of the fictional artist Nat Tate). And we will ask: Is it okay to perpetrate a cruel hoax so long as it’s for artistic reasons and no money changes hands? And: What is the connection between fiction and story-telling and deception and wishful thinking? Where is the dividing line between Art and Truth and Literature and Lies??

We may not come to any solid conclusions