The time-honored answer to this what-gives-you-the-right question is: creative imagination, which for the writer is a muscular species of empathy. Okay, I’m not you, the logic goes, but if I take the time to observe you carefully, if I study how you navigate the world, if I listen to you when you speak, then in time I can begin to imagine what it feels like to be you. Obviously, the important word here is “begin,” because employing creative imagination isn’t as simple as asserting your right—obligation?—to let your imagination range freely. – Harper’s