What’s In a Story?
The True Value of Narrative
Preface: this
post was inspired by Edwin, my classmate in PIPD 3230 and 3260. We discussed the value of storytelling on a
few occasions and two things he said to me have been the source of much reflection:
1.
Many cultures have a story of a Great Flood.
2. Nature
is talking to us all the time, we just have to take the time to listen.
Much of the way we learn is through literature and other
sources of storytelling. Narrative, or
the telling of stories in entwined in every culture and age. Moral dilemmas have been a feature of
literature since Sophocles wrote Oedipus Rex.
Throughout history, literature and dramatic works have been the source
of ethical and moral debate. Much of the
allure of the cinema is how open to debate the conclusion of a film is (what is
Rosebud in Citizen Kane or what is in the brief case in Pulp Fiction)
Alternative endings, unreliable narrators (The Good
Soldier) have made many of us become deconstructive and structuralist
viewers/readers.
We view scenes and read passages in movies/literature with
a jaundiced eye. We KNOW something is
wrong. We are always looking for the
‘angle’. Nothing is at face value: even
children’s animated features have a ‘twist’.
Personally, I enjoy ‘figuring’ out the twists of a plot or deciphering
the truth out of the puzzle presented by unreliable narrators.
“Truth is
stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to
possibilities; Truth isn't.” ― Mark Twain
The downside to all this is that fiction or true fantasy is
a lot less common in recent film and literature. Of the top films nominated for Best Picture Oscars
in the last ten years, only Toy Story 3 (2010) and has a purely fictional plot. Although
many of the films have some or many fictional elements, the majority of the
films nominated for Best Picture are steeply based either on real events or
events which are very realistic.
What does this mean?
It means that people often like to experience stories they can related
to in some way or know something about, in other words people enjoy narratives
(stories) that align with their own lives.
This is borne out by a recent article by Lee Siegel in the
New York Times titled, “Is the News Replacing Literature?”
In
this article, Siegel points to recent stories in the popular press, the accusations
of sexual abuse by Woody Allen of his step daughter, Dylan Farrow specifically,
and suggests that more people discuss news stories than they do literature,
film or other sources of ethical dilemmas as they did in the past.
Siegel
goes on to say:
“you could be
forgiven for feeling that literary art…has been largely displaced by life—or,
at least, by the pictures of life ceaselessly produced by the all-powerful
media—as the realm in which we lose ourselves in a moral problem….This is not
just ‘the news’. This is a piece of reality so dense that it goes beyond art in
illuminating just how nebulous reality is. (But, then, the news stopped
reporting reality and started to constitute a new layer of reality years ago.)
I believe that Siegel’s point is that
traditionally literature (I would argue film as well) was the most common
source of ethos and as such promoted a forum for the discussion of ethics and
morality. In the society we live in
today, our most common source of ethos is the news, which on the surface seems
like a good thing – after all, what can be a better teacher than reality?
The problem is that parables,
allegories, myths, legends, etc. are carefully constructed in order to engage
our minds and to teach important lessons.
Plato’s Allegory of the cave is not just a story of people imprisoned in
a cave and not knowing the truth about the outside world – it is also a
depiction of the illusion of self-limitation and for only accepting things we
think we know (our reality) and the dangers of not enlightening ourselves to
greater truths (new discovery and knowledge) by holding on to only what we
believe and giving into fear when our reality is challenged.
In conclusion, my point is this; storytelling
plays an important role in the development of our minds. Storytelling and analogies are the most
typical sources of discussions which facilitate the promotion of critical
thinking skills. If we draw all of our
discussion from the news, the classic sources of debate and philosophical
education are lost and we become lost intellectually as a result.
What is your view – have I perched
myself too far over the edifice of a philosophical cliff? What are your views?
Further
resources:
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