Truth As a Goal, Not a Point of Departure

In The Art of Fiction, which possesses that virtue, rare for books on writing, of actually being worth reading (though it is typically assigned to those who aren't ready to), John Gardner has this to say about telling the truth:

"Telling the truth in fiction can mean one of three things: saying that which is factually correct, a trivial kind of truth, though a kind central to works of verisimilitude; saying that which, by virtue of tone and coherence, does not feel like lying, a more important kind of truth; and discovering and affirming moral truth about human existence -- the highest truth of art. This highest kind of truth, we've said, is never something the artist takes as a given. It's not his point of departure but his goal. Though the artist has beliefs, like other people, he realizes that a salient characteristic of art is its radical openness to persuasion. Even those beliefs he's surest of, the artist puts under pressure to see if they will stand."

The emphasis is mine, because failure in fiction -- my own failures, at least -- always seem to flow from having forgotten this fact.