[Sybarite]

"Is fiction important?"

Yes.

Imagination is important.

Learning is important – and fiction, even though it's fiction, does not preclude information.

Fiction is well placed to challenge views and ideas. Dickens, for instance, used his fiction to help waken people to social conditions in Victorian England. Gore Vidal has used novels such as Myra Breckinridge to challenge notions of sex, gender and sexuality.

Indeed, the very fact that works of fiction have been banned illustrates how powerful some fiction is thought to be.

Fiction can allow ideas to be taken way beyond that which could be done in a non-fiction work, thus helping to explore subjects in new and different ways.

It's well placed to stretch readers' minds – not just with ideas, but also in terms of vocabulary, for instance.

Fiction is a form of entertainment – and we all need entertainment.

But to say 'no' would prompt the question of whether any of the arts – any cultural endeavour – is "important".

Is it more important than food and drink? Well, not – of course not. But once you have those, then (as a certain famous work of literature put it) "man cannot live by bread alone".