Reality Hunger

Reality Hunger: A Manifesto | David Shields

I got accepted into a summer nonfiction writing workshop and this is our “textbook”. I basically find Shields‘ worldview naïve; his proclamations in favor of collage & “mixing”, and against citation, are pretty funny in light of GenAI stealing the work of humans & shitting out assemblage. But I liked some of the stuff about the generic blurring of fiction & nonfiction and the task of the memoirist. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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Billypar

Reality Hunger: A Manifesto | David Shields

so-so

I really enjoyed the unique structure and concept - 618 short passages, some authored by Shields, while others are quotations, bits of interviews or other materials to fit each chapter's theme. Those themes also cover interesting intellectual topics on the fraught border between fiction versus nonfiction. But I kept hearing this implication that traditional fiction is tired and some new experimental fictive nonfiction is superior somehow 👇

Billypar It may not have been intended that way, but there seemed to be this repetition of personal preference posing as argument that I found annoying. I had assumed the title Reality Hunger: A Manifesto was meant to be funny, but there was so little humor in the book itself, unless it was supposed to be a self-deprecating nod at his desire to argue for preferences. Even as a flawed effort, I still found it worth reading and puzzling over. 3y

Billypar The photo is from The German Film Museum in Frankfurt - my partner having fun with an interactive green screen: a little reality mixed with fiction seemed to fit. 3y

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