Verisimilitude
ˌverɪsɪˈmɪlɪˌtud
noun
the appearance of being true or real
Verisimilitude comes from the Latin word 'verisimilitudo,' meaning 'likeness to truth.' It is often used in literature and art to describe the quality of seeming to be true or real, even if the events or characters depicted are fictional.
See how J. R. R. Tolkien, Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra and 2 other authors use "verisimilitude", with its meaning, pronunciation and real book examples.
Examples from books
When he had landed on the roof of his building he sat for a time, weaving together in his mind a story thick with verisimilitude.
Philip K. Dick
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
On 30 October 1967 he wrote to Joy Hill at George Allen & Unwin, concerning a reader's query he had received about points in the Appendices to The Lord of the Rings : 'Personally I have ceased to bother about these minor "discrepancies", since if the genealogies and calendars etc. lack verisimilitude it is in their general excessive accuracy: as compared with real annals or genealogies!
J. R. R. Tolkien
The Fellowship of the Ring
His account of his supposed emotions, from the discovery of the loss of the revolver onwards, was a triumph of verisimilitude.
Josephine Tey
The Man in the Queue
Plots in fiction should be wedded to the understanding of the reader, and be constructed in such a way that, reconciling impossibilities, smoothing over difficulties, keeping the mind on the alert, they may surprise, interest, divert, and entertain, so that wonder and delight joined may keep pace one with the other; all which he will fail to effect who shuns verisimilitude and truth to nature, wherein lies the perfection of writing.
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
Don Quixote
