How are you creative?

Nonfiction writers require a strong ability to be creative. Let’s examine this answer.

Being creative is normally associated with writing fiction. The novelist writing the next blockbuster, or the short story writer compiling the next compelling story. Creating an original narrative, coming up with new characters, interweaving leitmotifs and themes – these are the bread and butter of fiction writing.

Artists, sculptors, painters are all creative people. Let’s make an observation here; good nonfiction writers are also creative.

Creativity is a requirement for writers of fiction, but it is not confined to the production of fictional materials. It is true that nonfiction writers cannot make up facts. If I wrote an article claiming that Napoleon Bonaparte invaded India and Pakistan, I would lose all credibility and be laughed out of town.

There is a large field of studies in the social sciences examining racism and in the United States. It is a valuable resource for anyone who wishes to understand the complexities of race, racism, slavery, segregation, immigration and so on in that country. Pretty dry stuff, how is that creative?

Ta-Nahesi Coates, the African American writer, wrote a highly original and creative book regarding the topic of racism and the experiences of racial minorities in the US. His 2015 book, Between the World and Me, is addressed to his adolescent son, he examines what it is like to grow up black in a racially stratified society.

His advice to his son is a book which showcases Coates’ perceptions and observations, his skill as a writer, and is a masterpiece of literary journalism. His book is read and consulted by academics and students across the English-speaking world. It involves serious subjects, and is definitely not fiction, but is a creative work. To write such a book, a person requires more than just a dry recitation of facts, but a highly creative mind.

The late great political scientist and historian Raul Hilberg (1926 – 2007) dedicated his working life to documenting and exploring the Holocaust. His books have become the go-to references for anyone who intends to understand such a complex, horrific, serious subject. Surely there can be no room for creativity or imagination in examining the Holocaust?

No, there is no space for Holocaust denial. Hilberg strenuously rejected any attempt to diminish or minimise the seminal importance of the genocide of European Jews. Yet Hilberg was a creative writer. Did he fabricate claims or hallucinate facts, in the same way generative AI does? Of course not.

Hilberg demonstrated his remarkable creativity in his 1996 book The Politics of Memory: The Journey of a Holocaust Historian. A wide-ranging memoir, he explains his background, his formative years, his experiences in writing and publishing, and his lifelong struggle to have the Holocaust taken seriously as a topic of study.

We do not realise it now, but Hilberg’s books, especially his major study, The Destruction of the European Jews, were rejected by multiple publishers. Nobody was interested in reading about such a depressing subject; mass killings, gas chambers, starvation, concentration camps, treating people as just numbers – who needs all that?

Hilberg demonstrated his resilience and creativity in making the Holocaust an object of popular curiosity not just among those directly impacted by, and survivors of, that particular genocide. To put it plainly, it does not have to happen to you to make it matter to you.

Hilberg’s creativity resides in his efforts to ensure that post-World War 2 generations do not forget about the magnitude and importance of the Holocaust. The scale of the suffering should not blunt our ability to make sense of it.

Having a true story to tell is great, but it is not enough. Creating a narrative arc, developing your voice, elaborating the cast of characters with all their motivations and emotional complexities – these are all required to write a compelling body of nonfiction.