On Fictional Truth (First Impressions of Michael Riffaterre’s book)

In one of the classic works of the study of narrative, “Fictional Truth”, Michael Riffaterre makes the argument that fiction is, in fact, truth. This is not to say that Riffaterre argues that the events which transpire in any given work of fiction are as factual as recorded history, although at times this sentiment is certainly present, but he does make the argument that because fiction is grounded on linguistic forms, repetitive structure, mimetic considerations, representations of veracity, and what he calls “the suppression of verisimilitude and the suppression of the component of time”, it can be argued that narrative is, in fact, truth.