[A] sentence spun from the imagination, i.e., a sentence composed as a
lie, confers upon the writer a degree of perception or acuity or
heightened awareness--some additional usefulness--that a sentence
composed with the most strict reverence for fact does not.
-- E.L. Doctorow. "False Documents" in Jack
London, Hemmingway, and the Constitution: Selected
Essays.1977-1992. New York: HarperPerennial (1994).