bell hooks & Fiction

In her research paper “‘A Failure of the Imagination’? The Fiction vs. Nonfiction Debate,” Sophie Cunningham quotes Richard Ford in his statement of how “‘the realm of the imagination eludes readers more and more. In fact it irritates them. They want facts, and when they do read fiction they try and pin down the ‘real’ facts that underlie the novel.’” A phenomenon that has grown increasingly prevalent in recent years, Cunningham relates this observation back to her argument of how the push in the last decade to consume more nonfiction, at the expense of fiction, is a “failure of the wider, cultural imagination” and the societal emphasis on consuming work that directly benefit the reader by supplying them with applicable, real-world knowledge (this is common among readers of self-help books, for instance) — instead of stories that simply mindlessly entertain.

I prescribed to this notion for much of middle school after I discovered that nonfiction was more than simply bullet-pointed facts about topics I had no interest in, until I realized that the only reason I became so enamored with reading in the first place as a kid was because of the respite I found within fictional spaces like Rowling’s Hogwarts and Bemelmans’ Paris.

Following this revelation, over the summer, I came across a chapter in Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom by author and educator bell hooks called “Theory as a Liberatory Practice” in which she explains how theorizing, while not being inherently “healing, liberatory, or revolutionary,” is often the first step to achieving such states of being. Such was the case for her in her youth as an emotionally-neglected child whose voice was drowned out by adults who believed that children’s thoughts were of no value. In other words, “theorizing,” or the mere act of thinking and dreaming about a life different from the one hooks led, allowed her a judgment-free space in which she could escape the wounds her home life inflicted and imagine a reality in which she unconditionally mattered and was accepted. As she states, “Living in childhood without a sense of home, I found a place of sanctuary in ‘theorizing,’ in making sense out of what was happening…Fundamentally, I learned from this experience that theory could be a healing place.”

Furthermore, hooks insists how “When our lived experience of theorizing is fundamentally linked to processes of self-recovery, of collective liberation, no gap exists between theory and practice.” This is where the relevance of fiction as it pertains to healing comes into play. Because fiction is another form of theorizing (the production and consumption of it is simply theorizing on paper), it reaps the same benefits as theorizing purely in your head. Thus, more than simply being a mechanism for mental and emotional escape, fiction can be a place of healing.

“A place of healing” can mean many different things, but I will be evaluating how fiction can serve those affected by trauma. As Michelle Balaev defines in Mosaic, “Trauma, in my analysis, refers to a person's emotional response to an overwhelming event that disrupts previous ideas of an individual's sense of self and the standards by which one evaluates society.” This is the definition I will be referring to when I mention trauma. In consideration of this, it is no surprise that the emotional intensity of trauma demands the radical care of fiction.

Trauma is especially present in Toni Morrison’s only short story, “Recitatif” (Treisman). It is striking that Morrison never explicitly laid out the racial identities of the two protagonists in “Recitatif” in a time when American society deemed them as particularly critical to their overall identities (Joseph). Depicting her characters independently of their racial identities — while observing all the ways in which they are affected by those parts of their identity — was something that could have only been achieved through writing fiction.

To elaborate, in late 1950s - 1970s America, race was a critical part of one’s identity and often the first thing that people thought about when first perceiving others (Joseph). It still is, even though the fact that it is one of the first things that people notice about a person is not inherently wrong or racist; it is the weight of the interpretation of this “taking in” where the problem lies because of the stereotypes that sometimes come with it. Thus, by deliberately omitting the characters’ race, as Morrison states in an interview about “Recitatif,” the audience has no other choice than to see them as human. The reader must think critically about their identities now. Through omitting the racial identities of her characters, Morrison was able to create a world in which her readers could imagine a world in which the core identities of the protagonists, and their consequent reactions to the changing tides about the relationship between Blacks and Whites between when they first meet and when the story leaves off, are singly evaluated.

Studies have shown that racism is learned, not something that people are born with (Peek). In the United States, it has been reinforced through a legacy of segregation and discrimination, so that many have great difficulty distinguishing one’s race and character (Peek). This is how Morrison’s “Recitatif” serves as a healing space for those who have been harmed by this societal tendency, while providing a space for everyone to better imagine a path out of a world that is still plagued with racial injustice.

However, there is a range with which fiction can be a place of healing — some pieces of fiction will innately be more healing to readers than others. bell hooks argues that feminist transformation — and by extension, personal transformation — can only be achieved through a critical examination of one’s “personal experience” and their consequent “personal testimony” on it. Thus, because fiction is fundamentally built on one’s experiences (this pertains to the author) and the perception they develop of the world in response to those experiences (this pertains to the reader), fiction can be a mechanism for personal transformation, in addition to healing (although they are not mutually exclusive) when the reader becomes as equally willing to grow from the fiction they consume as the author is in writing it.

This is not to say that fiction is the definite answer to healing decades of intergenerational trauma, or even simple qualms (Balaev). In fact, Sean Field writes in Oral History that “All writing, remembering and transmission of memories are selective, which means that ‘regeneration’ will leave new silences and issues to be confronted in the future. There is neither healing nor redemption in regeneration, only possibilities for improved living.” Writing and consuming fiction is an imperfect way to achieving a more “perfect” life: one in which one is untethered to the burden of memory and empowered with the awareness that this life is one’s own to pursue it to the ends of the world. However, through the continual production and consumption of fiction, works like hooks’ “Theory as a Liberatory Practice” and Morrison’s “Recitatif” demonstrate how one can get closer to a more “perfect” life — the kind of life that we believed the world to be in our childhoods, and the kind of life that we deserve.💖

Works Cited

“‘A Failure of the Imagination’? The Fiction Vs. Nonfiction Debate on JSTOR.” www.jstor.org. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41957300?searchText=nonfiction+over+fiction&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dnonfiction%2Bover%2Bfiction&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_search_gsv2%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3Ad9d0d37ba1bbef6742127b74da5992b7&seq=1.

“Beyond ‘Healing’: Trauma, Oral History and Regeneration on JSTOR.” www.jstor.org. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/40179842?searchText=sean+field&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dsean%2Bfield&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_search_gsv2%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3Abdb8a9325f774bb97d9d2b6636e2f078.

“The Black Power Movement: A State of the Field on JSTOR.” www.jstor.org. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/25622477?searchText=race+in+1960s+america&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Drace%2Bin%2B1960s%2Bamerica&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_search_gsv2%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3Af14172e0ec56e91ec8f35b615112e652.

Hooks, Bell. “Theory as Liberatory Practice.” Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, openyls.law.yale.edu/bitstream/handle/20.500.13051/7151/05_4YaleJL_Feminism1_1991_1992_.pdf?sequence=2&isAllowed=y.

Morrison, Toni. Recitatif. Random House, 2022.

Peek, Monica E., et al. “Practical Lessons for Teaching About Race and Racism: Successfully Leading Free, Frank, and Fearless Discussions.” Academic Medicine, vol. 95, no. 12S, Nov. 2020, pp. S139–44, doi:10.1097/acm.0000000000003710.

Treisman, Rachel. “Toni Morrison’s Only Short Story Is Available in Book Form for the First Time.” NPR, 1 Feb. 2022, www.npr.org/2022/02/01/1077198351/recitatif-toni-morrison-short-story#:~:text=Toni%20Morrison%20%E2%80%94%20the%20late%20author,short%20story%3A%20%22Recitatif.%22.

“Trends in Literary Trauma Theory on JSTOR.” www.jstor.org. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/44029500?searchText=trauma&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dtrauma&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_search_gsv2%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3Af488bbcbd898960a41805b448d610cd2&seq=2.