My mother’s first criterion for a man is that he be interesting. What this really means is that hebe able to appreciate my mothe
r, whose jokes hinge on some grammatical subtlety or a workingknowledge of higher mathematics. You get the picture. Robbie is about as interesting as a pair ofred high-top Converse sneakers. But Robbie points to the mattress on the floor. He grins, slowlyunbuckling his belt, drops his jeans. "Lie down," says Robbie.This is interesting enough for me.Another thing: we want a sense that an important character, like a narrator, is reliable. We want tobelieve that a character is not playing games or being coy or manipulative, but is telling the truth tothe best of his or her ability. (Unless a major characteristic of his or hers is coyness or manipulationor lying.) We do not wish to be crudely manipulated. Of course, we enter into a work of fiction to bemanipulated, but in a pleasurable way. We want to be massaged by a masseur, not whapped by acarpet beater.This brings us to the matter of how we, as writers, tell the truth. A writer paradoxically seeks thetruth and tells lies every step of the way. It’s a lie if you make something up. But you make it up in thename of the truth, and then you give your heart to expressing it clearly. You make up your characters,partly from experience, partly out of the thin air of the subconscious, and you need to feel committedto telling the exact truth about them, even though you are making them up. I suppose the basic moralreason for doing this is the Golden Rule. I don’t want to be lied to; I want you to tell me the truth, andI will try to tell it to you.
