Fiction Comes From a Word for Moulding Clay
Fiction is invented narrative. Its Latin root means to shape or mould, which makes a novelist a kind of potter.
Fiction is writing about events that did not happen. The Latin *fingere* means to shape or mould, as a potter shapes clay — the same verb behind *figure*, *figment*, *feign* and *effigy*. A fiction is something formed rather than found.
- Invented narrative. *She only reads fiction.*
- Something untrue accepted for convenience. *A legal fiction.*
- A lie or invention. *The whole account was a fiction.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Noun | fiction | Modern fiction. |
| Adjective | fictional | A fictional town. |
| Adjective | fictitious | A fictitious name. |
| Verb | fictionalise | Fictionalised events. |
| Opposite | non-fiction | The non-fiction shelf. |
How it is used in a sentence
- The novel is fiction, but the city is real.Fiction is uncountable in this sense.
- He signed the register under a fictitious name.Fictitious implies deception.
- Corporate personhood is a legal fiction.Something the law treats as true for a purpose.
Fictional or fictitious?
- Fictional — belonging to a work of fiction (*a fictional detective*)
- Fictitious — false, made up to deceive (*a fictitious address*)
- Fictive — rare and technical, meaning created or assumed
- Legal fiction — an assumption the law adopts on purpose
- Non-fiction — the category for everything factual
From Latin *fictionem*, a fashioning or feigning, from *fingere*, to shape. English used it first for pretence, and only later for a respectable literary category.
Fictional or fictitious?
A fictional character lives in a story. A fictitious claim is a lie. Using fictitious for novels sounds accusatory.
What is a legal fiction?
Something the law treats as fact for convenience, such as a company being a person, even though everyone knows it is not literally true.