Fiction as Argument

“And another thing.  And what about this idea?  But you should really also consider this somewhat contradictory line of reasoning.  This is all messy, but I come down squarely on this side of the argument.”

This is the typical subtext of Dave Egger’s novel, The Circle.  It’s the story of a young woman hired for an entry-level position by a powerful Facebook/Google-like company of the near future.  She quickly rises through the ranks to a position of great visibility, and we as readers witness her gradual conversion to the dark side, to the place where privacy is evil, secrets are lies, transparency is paramount, and human values are essentially lost.  The ending is very dark, indeed.

It’s a long parable.  Parables should last a few pages and be done.  This one goes on for five hundred pages.  Eggers makes his arguments; the points are well taken.  In the end, the debate judges predictably side with the author.

But when I read fiction I’m looking for much more than argument.  I’m hoping for richness of language, depth of character, complex situations where morality is severely strained by the understandable immediacy of human need.  I’m seeking contradictions that both delight and baffle; I’m looking for imagery that glimmers and characters that frustrate.  None of this comes here.  It’s really not a novel at all. It’s an argument thinly disguised as third-person narration of one character’s Google-glass-like take on her experience.  It comes across as adolescent, and is severely

constrained by Egger’s evidently urgent need to make point after point.

I have great respect for Eggers.  I’d love to read the fifty-page non-fiction piece that makes his well-considered argument.  It might well be both interesting and compelling. But the propagandistic novel that he actually wrote requires paragraph-by-paragraph translation from fiction to argument.  Just write the argument, dude.

 That being said I am haunted by Egger’s take on this topic as I go about my daily digital life.  Just catching up on my Twitter feed now has a sinister resonance that it didn’t have before.  OK, I get it.  But I didn’t sign up for reading a long young-adultish quasi sci-fi novel that nags at me like a Jewish grandmother.

It is easy to read, and take into account that I am old[ish].  But go forth with caution. Even dystopian fiction should do more than ask us to track the argument on a scorecard.  We also need to wonder, cry, laugh, and maybe shiver. I'm more interested in the questions than the answers.