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In all seriousness suppose any of you ever watch the movie Lawrence of Arabia. Most know the name and few have a rough idea of what it's about, but not that many have actually taken the time to sit down and see it. If you've never seen it I'm sure the film will give you some new insight into, maybe even empathy for arab culture and how the Middle East became what it is today. Maybe you'll decide to pick up seven pillars of wisdom, though I'd have to caution that it's dense and difficult to get through. Anyway, thousands have seen it before you and the movie and book have been an inspiration for generations of people interested in Arab history, cultures and conflicts.

Yet both the film and the book are mired in historical inaccuracies and even fiction, although the story is also true. Do these issues detract from people's newfound understanding & interest in its subject matter? No. In fact, it probably helped many discover something new or adjust their existing preconceived notions. I'm certain that even you two have watched a film which made you reach for a book or article or made you think.

The point is that a work of art about historical events doesn't immediately lose all value because of some fictitious or innacurate scenes. If it's popular, invariably it also increases public interest in the real history behind it, which can only be seen as a good thing. It's been true for many series and movies - some much more respectful of the history than others. Usually, the farther back in time we go the worse the deviation from historical fact in film becomes. As a history buff myself I've been annoyed with it a number of times, though we shouldn't forget that works of art usually have other intentions than simply being documentaries about the past.

In comparison to many of these works I have to restate that chernobyl does a good job, which isn't acknowledged at all by most of the people throwing a fit over 'historical accuracy'. It's also unclear to me what you do expect from a historical dramatisation instead, considering that it is fictitious by definition. Beyond that, as a bonus, the series also caused a huge surge of interest in the event. While the Chernobyl disaster was slowly fading into a distant past, more people than ever before are now reading about it, thinking about the subject and visiting the area.

What point is there to art & fiction if it's not supposed to make us think Dilbert? And how do you deal with works that mix fiction & fact to varying degrees?

heaven forbid you guys discover kapuscinski or tokarczuk or this new-fangled thing called creative non-fiction that hasn’t been all the rage for, oh i don’t know, the last 15 years. a real mind-melter! wHeRE’s tHe boUnDaRieS?

lots of fiction from the c 20th onwards has called into question the nature and veracity of memory, individual and collective (you could say it coincided with a new type of science that had an increasingly shaky grip on so-called ‘objective’ reality, positivistic approaches, etc). that’s precisely why the alexievich method is so good. she just collects oral and witness testimonies and let’s them be, only arranged and curated in a certain tableaux-like way.

Last edited by uziq (2019-06-22 03:09:45)

Nations don't base their middle-east policy on Lawrence of Arabia or other fictionalised works.
Is this news to you?

Except Israel, their Waco-like outpost is based on fairy stories and superstition.

Dilbert_X wrote:

Nations don't base their middle-east policy on Lawrence of Arabia or other fictionalised works.
Is this news to you?

Except Israel, their Waco-like outpost is based on fairy stories and superstition.

That Iraq WMD dossier would like a word...

Larssen wrote:

https://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/reading-lawrence-in-afghanistan-the-seven-pillars-of-counter-coin-wisdom

Read the first paragraph. The writer is a little too enthusiastic but it's true the book became recommended (not required) reading at some point in the early 2000s. There's inaccuracies but the history is real and Lawrence & the Arabs did many of the things he wrote about.

Dealing with people isn't a math equation Dilbert. If you're telling me art is for philosophical questions, maybe you can learn a thing or two by appreciating or thinking about its purpose a little more.

Are we talking about the book or the film now?
Obviously a book written by a first hand witness would be useful, a fictionalised account created 50 years later somewhat less.

Larssen wrote:

A number of key events in the book have also been contested as fiction by historians at various points in time. I figured you referred to the story itself, not specifically the film. Which is also a bit strange considering I don't think anyone views a film in complete isolation of its source material.

So, like I said before:

separate fact from fiction and go from there

I'm not sure what is controversial about this.

how is ISIS anything like iran, more importantly?

well i didn't posit the first thing, did i? not sure many educated people did at the time, either. pointing at saddam after 9/11 was as mystifying then as now.

but i'm not sure what angle that graphic is taking. how is ISIS anything like iran?!?

not to mention the fact that ISIS were a tiny extremist sect imposed on people by terror and force and iran had, you know, a fucking gigantic popular revolution.

Jay wrote:

Because ISIS was a bunch of Sunni supremacists and Iran is Shi'a supremacist, duh. Totally the same and they totally get along. All muslims are the same.

And they're in conflict with jewish supremacists and we know who has to win that one.

Dilbert_X wrote:

Jay wrote:

Because ISIS was a bunch of Sunni supremacists and Iran is Shi'a supremacist, duh. Totally the same and they totally get along. All muslims are the same.

And they're in conflict with jewish supremacists and we know who has to win that one.

Rather the Jews, honestly. They just want to be left alone.