TST Philosophy of Fiction: Imaginative Realism

Imaginative Realism is the TST position that fiction arises from the recombination of real impressions rather than creation from nothing. Although fiction may purposely depart from factual reality, it remains reality-bound because imagination can only reshape materials provided by experience, perception, memory, language, emotion, and prior stories. Fictional stories are not empirically true as events, but they may still align with reality through symbolic, psychological, moral, narrative, and emotional truth. More broadly, the TST Philosophy of Fiction studies how stories relate to reality. Its central dichotomy explores truth in fiction and alignment with reality in nonfiction: fiction openly invents its narrative layer, while nonfiction is accountable for aligning that layer with what happened.