Notoriety and public confession in the literary form is a frazzler of the heart you were born with, believe me.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
That has always seemed to me one of the stranger aspects of literary fame: you prove your competence as a writer and an inventor of stories, and then people clamour for you to make speeches and tell them what you think about the world.
People are interested in writing, and often there's an unjustifiable sense of people to believe my talking to them for the book is going to accord them any sort of fame. Which it won't. At the same time, they can be more circumspect if they know they're on the record.
I still keep thinking someone will penetrate my guilty secret - that I have been masquerading as a writer all these years while all I was really doing was enjoying myself, pursuing my passion.
And yet because of my attempt at sincerity I have been condemned, hooted at, reviled; filthy rumors have been circulated about me, not about my characterizations but about me personally, my private self.
Autobiography is a genre notorious for falsehood.
I will say, with memoir, you must be honest. You must be truthful.
Sometimes writers say true things about the overall nature of publicity, promotion, and the publishing industry; but alas, not always.
It is so common to write autobiographical fiction in which your own experience is thinly disguised.
I think one can be more honest in fiction than in a memoir.
I've always had this impression that notoriety came when you're trying to get notoriety.