Answer:
The author's choice to consider real and fictional examples of 'dropouts' help him to evaluate his argument and main idea of 'right to fail.'
Step-by-step explanation:
'The Right to Fail' is an essay written by Wiliam Zinsser. The essay is about, as the title suggests, the right to fail. In today's generation, when people talk about American Dream, they mostly tend to think about success only and not failure. The term 'dropouts,' for many Americans, is a term of failure but it may not be for those who dropout, this may be a term for their own path of success, different from old traditional ways.
Using real and fictional examples of 'dropouts' helped the author to evaluate and give meaning to his argument and main idea of the text. By comparing the real examples of failure such as of Fred Zinnemann, Richard Brooks, etc and fictional example of Holden Caulfied from the novel The Catcher In The Rye, he was able to elaborate how definition of success can differ to various people.