pegkerr | Uses of story (Reply)

I have been thinking more about the discussion on my post about the United 93 movie. I am rash, perhaps, to go back to this topic, since the discussion waxed rather wroth, but I started thinking in a more general way about story after talking with

kijjohnson and will try to elaborate on my thoughts here.

I thought about how those who seemed the most uneasy that the movie was made at all particularly stressed that the movie wasn't true. The filmmakers dared to picture and film events which might have happened but others which maybe did not, and how did they dare to do so? First of all, it is all very distressing to relive these events, and second of all, wouldn't this muddling of the true and the fictional simply confuse people?

I realized, suddenly, that for a fiction writer like me (at least when I am not blocked) the question "is this story true?" sounds completely different to my ear than it does to a non-fiction writer like, say

minnehaha B. (to take a completely random example). When

minnehaha asks "is this true?" it means, did this event happen exactly this way? What proof do we have? Did the person depicted say exactly that? What was the precise sequence of events? Who knows these things? Are they trustworthy?

But to someone like me, the way I often use story (unconsciously much of the time, although I am looking at this process quite deliberately now) "Is it true?" means, does this tell a true thing about the way people really are? Is it fair? Does it get at the heart of things? Does it reflect the point of view accurately? Does it zero in on what is really matters?

Tolkien talked about the Cauldron of Story in in his essay Tree and Leaf; writers put bits of things into the cauldron, both delicate and unhealthy, and let it bubble and blend, and then eventually serve it up. As to the charge that the elements of the movie are too distressing to deliberately expose myself to again, yes, but the fiction writer part of me is always looking for powerful ingredients to add to my Cauldron. Understand, I don't mean that I have a taste for horror. I mean that there is something in me that seeks out stories of honor, of courage, power, of passionate clashes, of high stakes, choices that matter.

Tolkien had much to say about writing, or the highest form of it which he called "subcreation." Read "Tree and Leaf" to get all of what he says; I certainly can't boil it all down for you in a short LJ post, but much of it is on point here. He defends humanity's urge to make story (which is often under attack). We seek Recovery (a regaining of a clear view, of understanding things as they really are), Escape (not escape from reality--Tolkien cautions us to understand this as Escape of the Prisoner rather than Flight of the Deserter--but the Great Escape from death) and Consolation. United 93 did not quite achieve what Tolkien called "Eucatastrophe," the consolation of the unexpected joyous ending, as it would have if the passengers had managed to fight off the terrorists and safely land the plane. But it was certainly not the Dyscatastrophe, the sorrow and failure, that the other three flights were.

This is not to say that I fail to understand or value what the non-fiction writer sees and values about the story/history of United 93. I see those things, too. But my mind naturally follows other paths.

I remember a television production I saw of the Arabian Nights which was made in 2000, which had a most interesting and subtle consideration of story. The production made extremely clear that Scheherezade wasn't simply telling stories to the king to save her own life, to fascinate him so that he wouldn't kill her. The king, it was clear, was mentally and spiritually ill, sick to the heart by betrayal and unable to trust. She was actually physicking him, choosing and tailoring his stories based not on what would fascinate him the most, but on what he most needed to hear to become mentally whole again. He needed to hear this story because he needed to think about honor, about loyalty, about temptation and how to resist it. The king fell in love with Scheherezade not because he liked the stories, but because she healed him.

There have been cultures which have forbidden story-telling and playacting at all, insisting that people should not tell "lies." Myths are lies, though lies "breathed with silver," Lewis said, before his conversion to Christianity.

"No," Tolkien said, "they are true."

Perhaps the filmmaker has made a "myth" of the story of United 93, a "lie breathed with silver."

I think Tolkien was speaking of a meaning of "true" as I have tried to explain it here.

[Edited to add:

huladavid reminded me of another issue here: the question of who has the right to tell a story? Only the people it happened to? (What if there are no survivors; does this mean the story can never be told?) Only people from that city? That socio-economic group? That culture? That country? This was something I wrestled with when writing Swans: do I have the right to write from the P-O-V of gay men in New York City when I'm a (mostly) heterosexual chick from the Midwest?]

I may have confused you all horribly. I am not at all satisfied that I have made myself clear. If so, I am sorry. Anyway, your comments are invited--or at least until it all blows up into volcanic explosion and I have to shut it down again.