Fact or Fiction

Both English words, fact and fiction have Latin origins and were introduced to English around 1500 AD ± 30. Fiction is attested before fact which has changed its meaning to the modern one during the time of Elizabeth I and Shakespeare.

Online Etymology Dictionary informs

fact 

1530s, "action," especially "evil deed," from L. factum "event, occurrence," lit. "thing done," neut. pp. of facere "to do" (see factitious). Usual modern sense of "thing known to be true" appeared 1630s, from notion of "something that has actually occurred." Facts of life "harsh realities" is from 1854; specific sense of "human sexual functions" first recorded 1913.

fiction 

late 14c., "something invented," from O.Fr. ficcion (13c.) "dissimulation, ruse; invention," and directly from L. fictionem (nom. fictio) "a fashioning or feigning," noun of action from pp. stem of fingere "to shape, form, devise, feign," originally "to knead, form out of clay," from PIE *dheigh- (cf. O.E. dag"dough;" see dough). As a branch of literature, 1590s.

© 2001-2011 Douglas Harper


These two words are good examples of the complicated relationship between words and reality.

Everyday parlance may lead us to think that there is a very obvious difference between fact and fiction.

BBC news anchor tries to present facts about what is happening today and online dictionaries put many facts at our fingertips.

On the other hand, it is obvious that the amazing Harry Potter fantasy novels written by the British author J. K. Rowling belong to the world of fiction. Similarly, Hollywood movie producer George Lucas created fictional worlds and planets with two moons in his immensely popular Star Wars space opera. Some of the characters in Star Trek series speak a fictional language called klingon that consists of an invented vocabulary and grammar and can be studied in the same way as L.H. Zamenhof's esperanto or other such artificial languages.

And last but not least, J.R.R. Tolkien's mighty legendary stories about the hobbits. They feel so real and true to life in the books and in the spectacular new movie. There are many facts about hobbits in the online dictionary wikipedia. And yet, they are totally fictional characters!

The difference between fact and fiction thus seems crystal clear - even without a crystal ball.

So where is the problem?

The problem is that in all the examples of fiction given above the worlds imagined by the authors are totally intertwined with the facts of this reality of our world.

Please, let me explain that idea by examples in another post.