Mimesis Kills
On the subject of authors being mistaken for their characters (see post below, Song Talk), Dave from Geek Life sent along this link to the transcript of the interrogation of Langston Hughes during the McCarthy Hearings.
This bit reminds me of some punk zine interviews I have done:
Mr. Cohn: Mr. Hughes, when you wrote Scottsboro Limited,
did you believe in what you were saying in that poem?
Mr. Hughes: No, sir, not entirely, because I was writing in
characters.
Mr. Cohn: It is your testimony you were writing in
character and what was said did not represent your beliefs?Mr. Hughes: No, sir. You cannot say I don't believe, if I
may clarify my feeling about creative writing, that when you
make a character, a Klansman, for example, as I have in some of
my poems, I do not, sir... I don't think you can get a yes or no
answer entirely to any literary question, so I give you----
Mr. Cohn: I am trying, Mr. Hughes, because I think you have
gone pretty far in some of these things, and I think you know
pretty well what you did. When you wrote something called
``Ballads of Lenin,'' did you believe that when you wrote it?
Mr. Hughes: Believe what, sir?
Mr. Cohn: Comrade Lenin of Russia speaks from marble:
On guard with the workers forever-- The world is our room!
Mr. Hughes: That is a poem. One can not state one believes
every word of a poem.
Mr. Cohn: I do not know what one can say. I am asking you
specifically do you believe in the message carried and conveyed
in this poem?
Mr. Hughes: It would demand a great deal of discussion. You
can not say yes or no.