“One handles truths like dynamite. Literature is one vast hypocrisy, a giant deception, treachery. All writers have concealed more than they revealed.
But paradoxically, we create fiction out of human concern for the victims of the revelations. This concern is at the root of literature.”
The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol. 5
Diary entries (1914 - 1974)
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Anaïs Nin 278
writer of novels, short stories, and erotica 1903–1977Related quotes

“All writers have concealed more than they revealed.”
The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol. 5
Diary entries (1914 - 1974)
Context: One handles truths like dynamite. Literature is one vast hypocrisy, a giant deception, treachery. All writers have concealed more than they revealed.

"Quotes", The Educated Imagination (1963), Talk 2: The Singing School


“To overcome the resistance to truth, literature makes use of fictions that are images of truth.”
How to Understand Politics: What the Humanities Can Say to Science (2007)
Context: Literature... seeks to entertain — and why is this?... The reason, fundamentally, is that literature knows something that science does not: the human resistance to hearing the truth. Science does not inform scientists of this basic fact.... The wisdom of literature arises mainly from its attention to this point. To overcome the resistance to truth, literature makes use of fictions that are images of truth.

“The writer is more concerned to know than to judge.”
Source: The Moon and Sixpence (1919), Ch. 41, p. 140