semifictional en · ADJ
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *sem- Proto-Indo-European *sēmi Latin sēmi-bor. English semi- Proto-Indo-European *dʰeyǵʰ- Proto-Indo-European *-né- Proto-Indo-European *dʰinéǵʰti Proto-Italic *θingō Proto-Italic *fingōder. Latin fingō Proto-Indo-European *-tis Proto-Indo-European *-Hō Proto-Indo-European *-tiHō Proto-Italic *-tiō Latin -tiō Latin fictiōder. Old French ficcionbor. Middle English ficcioun English fiction Proto-Indo-European *h₂el- Proto-Indo-European *-is Proto-Indo-European *h₂élisder.? Proto-Italic *-ālis Latin -ālisbor. Old French -albor. ▲ Latin -ālis Old French -elbor. ▲ Latin -ālisbor. Middle English -al English -al English fictional English semifictional From semi- + fictional.
Meanings
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(not-comparable) Partially but not entirely fictional
As emotionally powerful as this is, there is a slight disconnect here: he is describing events in Vietnam that actually happened (stunning, little-remembered details about the American evacuation, including the story of the last two Americans to die, in John Kerry ’s words, “for a mistake”), but the events in Michigan — his father’s drunkenness and isolation, the disintegration of his parents’ marriage — are a semifictional, if plausible, recreation of what Bissell imagines his father to have been like during that time.
2007 March 4, Joe Klein, “Nam and Pop”, in New York Times: