Letters to the Editor
This letter is associated with the following article:
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gossip
I'm a novelist and a poet. My fiction is not autobiographical, largely because I do not like gossip. Have long distinguished, as several other letter writers do here, between storytelling and gossip. Story-telling I see as a deep and honorable human need. One of the fundamental elements of gossip is taking pleasure in the misfortunes of another. It is quite possible to be interesting about others without being catty.
It is not necessary to give up the pleasures of story-telling in order to put a lid on the all-too-human vanity of gossip.