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What is ‘Creative Nonfiction’?
There has been a rise of a genre called “creative nonfiction” in the last decade. Or at least a rise of calling it that.
Creative nonfiction, also called literary nonfiction and narrative nonfiction, is when writers use prose and storytelling to create a narrative — but the story is true.
Like John McPhee, a pioneer of creative nonfiction, wrote in his piece “Omission” in The New Yorker, “Creative nonfiction is not making something up but making the most of what you have.”
Like other nonfiction, these stories are real, true things that happened. But the telling of them is how they differ.
Common types of writing considered creative nonfiction are biographies and autobiographies, memoirs, self-help, literary journalism, travel writing, and personal essays.
Think about it like this: A newspaper reporter is giving the facts of an event, usually in chronological order. They say what happened and move on. Someone writing a memoir is writing the real, true story of their life but in a way that tells a story and usually from the first-person point of view.
Creative nonfiction is fact-based but interesting to read. The creative part is in the retelling of the story.
As Lee Gutkind, author of The Best Creative Nonfiction, Vol 1 and creator of…
