From the Halls of Montezuma

Jarhead author Anthony Swofford spoke on the radio today about his new novel. The interviewer asked him to distinguish between the experience of writing a memoir and writing fiction. I don't remember how Swofford replied.

You might remember the bit in Jarhead about the dude who received a videotape from his wife. The video was supposed to be a Vietnam movie. So he sat down with a bunch of his buddies to watch it. They stuck the tape in the deck and let it roll. After a few minutes tape cut to some home movie porn footage that had been spliced into the movie. Lo and behold, it's the guy's wife boning his neighbor.

Yeah, well, it didn't happen. Swofford didn't even make it up. He plagiarized an existing urban legend. I guess that counts as a two-fer.