Deviate Travel memoir lab: Truth, luck, & multi-genre storytelling (with Tom Bissell)
12 snips
Oct 17, 2023 Tom Bissell, an accomplished author and journalist known for works like The Disaster Artist, shares insights from his eclectic career. He candidly discusses his rocky start in the Peace Corps and the serendipity that shaped his writing journey. Luck and perseverance play pivotal roles in his growth, while he explores the art of transforming real people into compelling nonfiction characters. Bissell reflects on the dichotomy of commercial success and personal pride in his works, urging creatives to embrace vulnerability and detach from external judgments.
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Learn One City Of Writing
- Treat narrative skills as transferable across genres by focusing on detail, truth, people, and narrative. Learn principles of other modes instead of confining yourself to a single 'neighborhood' of writing.
Making Real People Into Characters
- Bissell recounts turning real people into characters, using a pseudonym 'Rastam' for an Uzbek figure and compressing events for narrative. He emphasizes staying truthful while accepting necessary narrative adjustments.
Rejected Reporting Became Fiction
- A long magazine piece Bissell wrote from Afghanistan was rejected for length and later reshaped into the short story 'War Zones for Idiots.' He often converts unused reported material into fiction set in places he's visited.
