I reject the idea of a universal story. It is reductive, uninformative and diminishes the power of the narrative in our imagination. It requires a myopic view of both our past and future to imagine that the basic human story is unchanging in time. We tell our stories in time, and therefore they evolve with us. Even as we retell supposedly timeless stories, we shift the emphasis around and allow our current ideas to infiltrate them as viewed through our modern lenses.
Against the Universal Story
Admittedly this is perhaps argument for argument's sake, since I am not really familiar with the term "Universal Story" and all that it is meant to connote. It is a phrase that I heard or invented, and stuck in my mind, bothering me as I invented my own meaning for it. What follows is my response to that "invented meaning".
I reject the idea of a universal story. It is reductive, uninformative and diminishes the power of the narrative in our imagination. It requires a myopic view of both our past and future to imagine that the basic human story is unchanging in time. We tell our stories in time, and therefore they evolve with us. Even as we retell supposedly timeless stories, we shift the emphasis around and allow our current ideas to infiltrate them as viewed through our modern lenses.
I reject the idea of a universal story. It is reductive, uninformative and diminishes the power of the narrative in our imagination. It requires a myopic view of both our past and future to imagine that the basic human story is unchanging in time. We tell our stories in time, and therefore they evolve with us. Even as we retell supposedly timeless stories, we shift the emphasis around and allow our current ideas to infiltrate them as viewed through our modern lenses.
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