For a creative nonfiction writer, the pen on paper flows like the blood, sweat, and tears of honest experiences that make life, life. This is true and a real aspect of being a nonfiction writer. It has the connotation of being vulnerable and fragile. It’s seen as an open dialogue into someone’s reality, facts of their life. In some cases, like in traumatic memoirs, a celebrity exposing a rocky childhood and rooted details about their life, for example, creative nonfiction is in fact vulnerable and deeply personal.
But I’d argue, of all the thoughts about life and human experiences shared through a nonfiction lens, there is nothing more personal, vulnerable, and exposing as writing fiction. I have the utmost respect for fiction writers (and disinterest in writing fiction for this very reason. Plots, character development, the creating of new worlds or languages or colonies come from a deep sense of imagination and is a window into the soul of the writer. Coming up with the details that create a world that a reader gets to escape into takes boldness and courage to share hidden, personal elements that come from you heart, mind, and soul that started from nothing but your imagination, and that is a vulnerable thing to share with the world.
