Truth and Lies
Jan. 29th, 2004 07:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pegkerrThe girls and I have been listening to the BBC radio production of the Lord of the Rings on the way home each day (it's 13 CDs in all, so it takes a while to get through it). One line really jumped out at me last night, from the scene where Frodo and Faramir meet. Frodo tells him: "I told no lies, and all the truth that I could."
I've been brooding about that line all day, and I talked with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kijjohnson about it when we talked last night. It seems to me that this line rather neatly sums up a quality that I strive for in living my own life in general, and in approaching my writing in particular. No lies, yes--but it's not enough to simply say "I will tell the truth." Sometimes truth is difficult to know, and so you have to take the effort to discover it. Sometimes you need to work hard to work up the courage to say it, and perhaps your courage isn't quite there yet, but keep trying and it will be. Sometimes unfolding the truth is an ongoing process: you keep learning more and more as you go, and you must keep adding to it. And sometimes you can't tell all of it that you know, for other reasons: perhaps it will hurt other people, or perhaps, like Aslan says, it's not your truth (or story, as Aslan put it) to tell.
But, yeah. I will tell no lies, and all the truth that I can.
That's the new subtitle on my LiveJournal
I've been brooding about that line all day, and I talked with
kijjohnson about it when we talked last night. It seems to me that this line rather neatly sums up a quality that I strive for in living my own life in general, and in approaching my writing in particular. No lies, yes--but it's not enough to simply say "I will tell the truth." Sometimes truth is difficult to know, and so you have to take the effort to discover it. Sometimes you need to work hard to work up the courage to say it, and perhaps your courage isn't quite there yet, but keep trying and it will be. Sometimes unfolding the truth is an ongoing process: you keep learning more and more as you go, and you must keep adding to it. And sometimes you can't tell all of it that you know, for other reasons: perhaps it will hurt other people, or perhaps, like Aslan says, it's not your truth (or story, as Aslan put it) to tell. But, yeah. I will tell no lies, and all the truth that I can.
That's the new subtitle on my LiveJournal