Fiction possesses a remarkable ability to heal us in a world increasingly constructed of narratives. As we navigate lives shaped by social media personas, political storytelling, and corporate mythmaking, literature offers us both escape and confrontation with the truth. Fiction paradoxically becomes one of our most reliable tools for making sense of our fabricated realities.
When we immerse ourselves in stories, we aren’t merely retreating from reality—we engage with it through a different lens. Fiction creates a safe distance from which to examine painful truths that might otherwise be too raw to process directly. This psychological buffer allows us to confront difficult emotions, traumatic experiences, and existential questions.
Consider how dystopian novels like “1984” or “The Handmaid’s Tale” provide frameworks for understanding authoritarian control and manipulation of truth. These fictional worlds illuminate patterns in our own society that might otherwise remain invisible to us. Through stories, we develop a vocabulary for experiences that defies easy categorization in our everyday discourse.
Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami once noted that even the strangest fiction must retain a core of believability, a certain resonance with reality. Emotional authenticity, not factual accuracy, is the focus of this reality. A well-crafted story resonates because it speaks to something true within us, even as it presents impossible scenarios or fantastical elements.
Our modern existence increasingly blurs the line between authentic experience and constructed narrative. We curate our lives for social media, presenting polished versions of ourselves that become fictions of their own. Political discourse relies more on compelling narratives than factual accuracy. Corporate branding creates mythologies around products and services. We live surrounded by fictions masquerading as reality.
Fiction helps us reclaim agency within this landscape. By consciously engaging with invented worlds, we develop critical faculties that help us identify the constructed nature of our supposed “real world.” Reading fiction enhances our empathy by allowing us to inhabit perspectives different from our own, and this empathic capacity becomes a tool for piercing through the falsehoods that divide us.
There’s something profoundly healing about recognising the fictions we’ve internalised. Many of us operate according to narratives we’ve absorbed unconsciously—about success, relationships, identity, and purpose. Fiction can make these implicit stories explicit, allowing us to examine and revise them. A character’s journey might illuminate our own self-deceptions or reveal alternatives to the stories we’ve been living by.
Art therapists have long recognised the therapeutic power of fictional storytelling. Creating or engaging with narrative allows us to externalize internal conflicts, making them more manageable. We can project aspects of ourselves onto characters, working through our own struggles through their fictional journeys. This process provides emotional catharsis and cognitive clarity.
Fiction’s healing capacity extends to collective trauma as well. Societies process historical wounds through literature, film, and other narrative arts. Stories help communities integrate painful histories into their collective identity without being defined solely by suffering. They offer frameworks for reconciliation and renewal.
In our hyper-connected yet isolated world, fiction also provides a sense of connection. Reading a novel is an intimate experience, a communion between writer and reader across time and space. We recognize our own struggles in fictional characters, realizing we’re not alone in our confusion, pain, or yearning.
Perhaps most importantly, fiction reminds us that alternative realities are possible. If our present reality feels constraining or false, stories show us that different worlds can be imagined and created. This imaginative capacity is essential for personal and social transformation.
The poet Muriel Rukeyser wrote that “the universe is made of stories, not atoms.” If our reality is indeed constructed of narratives, then engaging with fiction isn’t escapism—it’s a vital engagement with the very fabric of existence. By reading, writing, and sharing stories, we participate in the ongoing creation of meaning.
Fiction transcends mere escapism; through stories, we can confront the fictions imposed upon us, challenge narratives that no longer serve us, and pen new possibilities for our individual and collective future.
Pramudith D Rupasinghe
About the Author
Pramudith D Rupasinghe is a Sri Lankan writer and humanitarian. His literary works predominantly unfold in settings beyond his native Sri Lanka, for which he earned the name ‘Writer Without Borders. His work of fiction, ‘Bayan,’ set in pre-conflict Ukraine, won the Golden Aster Prize for Global Literature in 2020 and was longlisted for the 2023 Paris Book Festival. Rupasinghe’s works have been translated into several languages, including Sinhalese, Burmese, German, Spanish, Russian, Polish, Bulgarian and French. He has also dedicated two decades to humanitarian work, drawing inspiration for his writing from his missions to Africa, Europe, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. He is known for his thought-provoking narratives that delve into the human psyche, cultural identities, and global experiences.
