# Real Living People In Novels **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 6, 2012, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911 "2012-02-06T00:21:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![audit1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ed8c4c/32.png) [@audit1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/audit1)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 11:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/21 "2012-02-06T11:49:51Z")
Steve Allen wrote a series of novels where two of the characters are Steve Allen and Jayne Meadows. ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/22 "2012-02-06T12:04:23Z")
Paul Auster wrote himself into **City of Glass**. [20th Century Dreams](http://www.amazon.com/20th-Century-Dreams-Nik-Cohn/dp/0375707085/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1328529150&sr=8-2), though not quite a novel, is dozens of snippets of fictional stories featuring pivotal historical and cultural figures of the 20th Century, some of whom are still alive. A recent Salman Rushdie novel– **Shalimar the Clown** , possibly?–features a character based on Madonna who’s actually named Madonna. It’s not a flattering depiction. Rushdie sent her a copy of the book; she sent it back shredded. One of my favorite films, **Almost Famous** , had lots of real and living people (Ben Fong-Torres, David Bowie, the surviving members of Humble Pie) as characters, interacting with _roman-a-clef_ and wholly fictional characters. The real and impersonated Jann Wenner both make brief appearances. ---
**Author:** ![Cumbrian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce7236/32.png) [@Cumbrian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cumbrian)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/23 "2012-02-06T12:07:40Z")
> [@Argent\_Towers](#): > > In _American Psycho_, there are several scenes where Patrick Bateman (the narrator) encounters famous people, including Tom Cruise, Bono, and some others I can’t remember. Brett Easton Ellis does a lot of this actually. Jay McInerney turns up in some of his novels and Glamorama has a load of cameos from famous people too. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/24 "2012-02-06T12:27:54Z")
Science Fiction author James P. Jogan had an interesting take on Time Travel novels – when a real, still-living person appeared in the past in his novel **The Proteus Operation** , it was because he had contacted that person and gotten their permission to use them (one example – Isaac Asimov). It’s the only time I’ve heard of anyone doing that. As **charmstr** has mentioned, W.P. Kinsella used J.D. Salinger as a character in his novel _Shoeless Joe_\* (and, I think, the short story it sprang from, _Shoeless Joe goes to Iowa_), apparently because Salinger had included characters named Kinsella in his own works. Kinsella didn’t ask Salinger his permission, and Saloinger was reportedly pissed, threatrening legal action if they used his name in any other versions or media, which is why the character in the film **Field of Dreams** had his name changed to _Terence Mann_. See the section at the Wikipedia page: > **[Shoeless Joe (novel)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoeless_Joe_(novel))** > > Shoeless Joe is a 1982 magic realist novel by Canadian author W. P. Kinsella that was later adapted into the 1989 film Field of Dreams, which was nominated for three Academy Awards. > The novel was expanded from Kinsella's short story "Shoeless Joe Jackson Comes to Iowa", first published in his 1980 collection of the same name. Kinsella first developed the idea for the story while attending the Iowa Writers' Workshop, and decided to incorporate the stories he told about the Black Sox Scandal, ima... As noted, there have been plenty of real people showing up in time-travel and historical novels. It’s rarer, but not really all that uncommon, for currently living well-known people to appear in (non satirical) works of fiction. Look at how Gary Coleman was a charactrer in the musical **Avenue Q**. As for authors showing up in their own works, that happens all the time, too. Clive Cussler shows up in several of his own novels, and two of Phuilip Jose Farmer’s series have featured characters with the initial PJF. ---
**Author:** ![samlefou](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@samlefou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samlefou)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/25 "2012-02-06T15:18:07Z")
I don’t have the book with me, so I can’t check to see if there are more, but both Anne Rice and Stephen King appear for a bit in House of Leaves. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/26 "2012-02-06T18:14:32Z")
> [@SeldomSeen](#): > > James Michener talked some about the difficulties inherent in naming living people in a novel - at least for an American author. When an author does this, he is setting himself up for a lawsuit from people that consider their name to be intellectual property. If someone does not like the way he/she is portrayed a suit for libel or defamation can cost a writer, or more likely the publisher a lot of money. Michener, in writing his novel _Space_ had included some kind of skulduggery by the “junior senator from Texas”. Since that person was still alive, the publisher adamantly refused to print that part of the book until Michener re-wrote it substituting the fictional state of Franklin and a non-existant politician. Well, that didn’t seem to stop _Primal Fear_, an entire movie (as opposed to a plot point in a larger work) set around the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Chicago, a cardinal (not all archbishops are cardinals), as a child molester when there were real-life allegations that the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Chicago, a cardinal, (the now-deceased Joseph Cardinal Bernardin) was a child molester. While the movie’s archbishop didn’t have the same name, it’s the same real office and real city. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/27 "2012-02-06T19:12:44Z")
_ **The Winshaw Legacy, or, Oh, What a Carve Up!** _ includes Margaret Thatcher as a character, in addition to mentioning many other real people. Although it embarrasses me to admit I read this, _ **Dating Big Bird** _ has Demi Moore in a scene. John Steinbeck showed up in _ **East of Eden** _, and, IIRC, he was alive when _ **East of Eden** _ was written. ---
**Author:** ![Morbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morbo/32/389_2.png) [@Morbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morbo)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/28 "2012-02-06T20:12:47Z")
IIRC there was a character in the John le Carré book The Constant Gardener who is real. The bush pilot that takes them around. Le Carré got to know him while visiting the area and decided to include him, real name and all, into the book, just as garrilous he is in real life. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/29 "2012-02-06T20:15:48Z")
In **A Deeper Blue** , John Ringo’s “hero” the Kildar several times expresses his desire to shove the nuke they acquired up Putin’s ass in repayment for a betrayal by the Russian leader. For that matter, Clive Cussler has made a habit of inserting himself (thinly disguised) into his novels. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/30 "2012-02-06T20:45:40Z")
> [@bup](#): > > _ **The Winshaw Legacy, or, Oh, What a Carve Up!** _ includes Margaret Thatcher as a character, in addition to mentioning many other real people. That reminds me of _The Queen and I_, a novel by Sue Townsend (most famous for the Adrian Mole books) in which the royal family is forced to live on a council estate (like normal people) after a republican revolution. ---
**Author:** ![Ichbin\_Dubist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/51bf81/32.png) [@Ichbin\_Dubist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ichbin_Dubist)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/31 "2012-02-06T21:56:16Z")
There are a few real Dubliners scattered throughout _Ulysses_, among them the publican Davy Byrne and scholars George Russell (A.E.) and Richard Irvine Best. The latter, at least, was irritated by it. ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2012, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/32 "2012-02-06T22:40:48Z")
In _Dante’s Inferno_, Dante meets two men in the 9th circle of Hell who were still alive at the time, Fra Albergio and Branca Doria. They explain that their crime, the murder of a guest, is so heinous that those who commit it are immediately sent to Hell, and a demon possesses the body that still lives in the mortal world. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/33 "2012-02-07T00:55:56Z")
IIRC there are other examples in Dante’s _Inferno_ as well. In keeping with the tradition, when Larry niven and Jerry Pournelle wrote their own take on it, **inferno** , they stuck in references to now-living celebrities undergoing eternal punishment in Hell, although not naming them. One of these was Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., easily recognized by their description of his writing, and his gravestone with a flashing neon sign: SO IT GOES…SO IT GOES…SO IT GOES… They also have a thinly-disguised Forrest J. Ackerman and, I think, an L. Ron Hubbard. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/34 "2012-02-07T01:04:22Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > how often do real living people appear in novels? Do graphic novels get extra points for _ **showing** _ the real-life folks? WATCHMEN had Nixon, Ford, Kissinger, Liddy, even Jackie O and John F Kennedy Jr… ---
**Author:** ![jordanr2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/838e76/32.png) [@jordanr2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jordanr2)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/35 "2012-02-07T01:04:58Z")
Elizabeth Taylor appears in J.G. Ballard’s _Crash_ as the target of an attempted murder, and in his _Atrocity Exhibition_ as the subject of a clinical description of a facelift. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Man\_With\_The\_Golden\_Gun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dc4da7/32.png) [@The\_Man\_With\_The\_Golden\_Gun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Man_With_The_Golden_Gun)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/36 "2012-02-07T01:12:08Z")
Does “Mick Crowley” in Michael Crichton’s _Next_ count? ---
**Author:** ![Euryphaessa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Euryphaessa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euryphaessa)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/37 "2012-02-07T02:01:59Z")
The Girl Who Played With Fire features Swedish boxer (now TV host) Paolo Roberto. He plays himself in the movie, too. He’s inordinately cute. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/38 "2012-02-07T03:32:12Z")
In Larry McMurtry’s _Baja Oklahoma_, Willie Nelson makes a surprise entrance at the protagonist’s concert, singing the hit song she wrote (“Baja Oklahoma”). ---
**Author:** ![panamajack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/47e85d/32.png) [@panamajack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panamajack)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/39 "2012-02-07T03:40:35Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Well I was talking about novels that had real living people-Turing, Goring, and MacArthur were all dead when the _Cryptonomicon_ was written. Anyone still-living at the time wasn’t depicted by name. But Earl Comstock was clearly based on Robert S. McNamara (Comstock worked as a businessman, founded an intelligence agency, was considered responsible for getting the US into Vietnam). A few other characters may have some partial basis on real-life people, but none quite so prominent as him. Other real-life things were altered for the sake of fiction (like Finux for Linux, ETC for IBM, or Ordo as a PGP-like setup) and some as a joke (Qwghlm as a nigh-unpronounceable version of the islands around Britain, or G.E.B. Kivistik as a nod to Douglas Hofstadter). ---
**Author:** ![MsJinx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@MsJinx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsJinx)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911/40 "2012-02-07T19:07:44Z")
I just finished Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. A character refers to Jeffrey Dahmer as having been one of the ‘monsters’ they are hunting. Kinky Friedman’s mysteries include himself, and Willie Nelson. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-living-people-in-novels/611911.md?page=3)