Lawrence Wright: Fiction goes where reporting cannot follow

"I started writing "The Human Scale," I guess many years ago because I spent so many years in the region. But I knew when I was writing this book that it was a dangerous book because people feel so strongly, one side or the other, and they're deaf to hearing any excuses or explanations for behavior from the other side. And that was a challenge. When things get black and white, that's when it gets really dangerous."

"Israel and Palestine are in a very black-and-white situation. It's all good or all evil. As a reporter, you can look into the eyes of the people you're talking to and try to evaluate what they're thinking when they say what they say. But you are not really gonna get into their brain. There's only one artistic form that allows you to do that. And that's a novel."

"For a novelist, it takes it another layer down. You get deep into the history and the imagination of your characters and their longings, their faults. You can portray them in a way in a novel that you can't any other way. And I wanted to open up spaces in the reader's mind that would allow them to see the humanity of people they don't normally sympathize with."

The Israel-Palestine conflict is characterized by polarized, black-and-white perceptions in which communities view each other as entirely good or entirely evil. Journalistic reporting can observe people's expressions and statements but cannot access their inner thoughts. Fiction, especially the novel, provides a unique artistic form that penetrates characters' histories, imaginations, longings and faults, allowing deeper portrayal and empathy. Repeated visits to Gaza and Israel reveal sympathetic individuals on all sides alongside persistent hatred and resentment. The 2009 Gaza invasion followed Operation Cast Lead after Hamas kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit and held him for five years.

Read at Big Think