Your task is to take the story about how evil comes into the world, the story King tells about the Witches’ convention in Chapter One of The Truth about Stories, and change it any way you want, except the ending. You can change to place, the people, the time – anything you want. But, your story must have the same moral – it must tell us how evil came into the world and how once a story is told, it cannot be taken back.
First, learn your story by heart, and then tell the story to your friends and family.
After you have told the story a few times, post a blog with your version of the story and some commentary on what you discovered about story telling.
There were once two immortal spirits who roamed the world by occupying the horizon together, above the skies. At first, they had no great influence on those below them. They would observe whatever interested them, and take on tasks of small miracles and punishments of misfortunes whenever they felt it was right. Slowly, they began to become one presence for all of the members that resided on a planet. They maintained the peace for the alternate beings around them. Even as the world continued to transform, the spirits had this inner understanding that they would continue living in harmony amongst other species, being this perfect entity to look up to: They would see this vast beauty of the sky–of colors they could only imagine in how to recreate, of images they could only fall short of, but would still try out of wonder and attempt of connection. It was a time where everyone thought of these spirits, who represented the good of the collective community, before making any decisions on their own.
All until one day, when there was the first trial of accusations and death on a most interesting case. There were a few beings who had lost interest in living and sacrificing for the long-term good, and began experimenting with risks. A bitter ‘son’ had murdered his own ‘father’. Having never understood the concept of death but of only moving through time, the spirits were unsure of how to deal with the situation. One of the spirits had developed a sympathy for the beings on this planet: They prevailed in forgiveness, believing that those who wronged others always deserved another chance. They also saw the potential in the ‘son’ and how it may have been neglected, and wanted to help. However, the other wanted the son to experience dire consequences, reasoning such from the loss of a ‘father’. For once, they could not agree with each other. This situation was only a catalyst for many more stories on how they disagreed in managing fate’s works.
The one exuding forgiveness wanted to instill some sort of Heaven, while the other became practically cynical of faith as beliefs that ‘do not come true’. This wholesome entity failed to be an example for the other beings around them, as they let their personal perspectives force them apart. They became the Sun and the Moon, holding different reflections on the horizon of life. Their eventual separation created a lot of angst over the years of possibilities and regrets, so that it made light, and at the same time, darkness, having wished upon nonexistence from one another, and having blurred the definition of love and goodness in the world.
And that was how this planet fell apart to create Earth. This is how evil was born, and resides now as a consciousness within us.
In regards to the solar eclipse and how the Sun and the Moon in my story represents this ultimate separation of good and evil, in nature: “What if evil doesn’t really exist? What if evil is something dreamed up by man, and there is nothing to struggle against except our own limitations? The constant battle between our will, our desires, and our choices?” -Libba Bray
King describes the elements in two stories in that “the elements in Genesis create a particular universe governed by a series of hierarchies…that celebrate law, order, and good government, while in our Native story, the universe is governed by a series of co-operations” (23). I initially wanted to bring both elements together, where the downfall comes from letting their own perspectives become their reality. It almost felt like I was recreating the images of “creators”, of a God and Satan that lived as one (at least, in my story). I went through another article about King’s perspective on storytelling, where he mentions that history is stories recounted from the past.
In the future of more intermingling cultures, I wonder if storytelling elements of myths and legends will be recombined in many art and storytelling pieces. For example, the lyrics in this seven minute song called Heaven by Ato x Eden, refer to Christianity (the valley of death), history (Malcolm X), and other beliefs (Yin and yang, the image of Venus) as a manner of connecting to his audience on his philosophy of life and its struggles, as well as the paradox on love and pain: “the dynamics of a lonely journey.” I think that in general, having multiple metaphors and images of other stories can amplify this common connection to understanding our morals and perspectives to begin with.
The people I have told this to have mentioned different things, for example having a particular admiration for the concept of how one of the spirits felt the right to establish a heaven on Earth. I wanted to keep both spirits unnamed and gender-less because for one, it intrigues me that the Christian God is referred to as a “He” while there are some who may use “Her” pronouns instead (an act of feminism, I’m not sure). In general I was able to remember the concept of the story.
A friend of mine commented on my story overall as a “good metaphor for the dissolution of black and white mentality” as the concept of evil in the real world moreso exists through a difference of perspective rather than a clearly evil decision by one particular side. I ended up telling her more about the inspiration I had from my favorite painting in a museum I went to this summer, found here. This abstract symbolism might be too much to wrap around, but here is more information on William Baziotes’s background and purpose in art. As there was no description by the painting, I came up with my own interpretation in which the middle white wavering line represented the unwavering horizon and two forces drawn in what almost looks like white graffiti (the circle, and another squiggly line). These forces are what reflects from the horizon. So one way to think about it is the separation of good (the circle) and evil (the serpentine line) constantly influencing our horizons.
(Note: Thanks to Chloe, I only updated the story as that involving humans to just alternate, mortal beings, so things might make a little more sense now.)
Works Cited
Ato & Eden. “Heaven”. Lyrics. Genius. Web. September 23, 2016.
Baziotes, William. Serpentine. 1961. Anderson Collection, 314 Lomita Drive Stanford, CA 94305. Anderson Collection. Stanford University. Web. 22 Sept. 2016.
Eastland, Jessie. Neapolitan Sunset. Digital image. Sunrise. Wikipedia, 24 July 2016. Web. 22 Sept. 2016.
King, Thomas. The Truth About Stories: A Native Narrative. N.p.: House of Anansi, 2003. Print.
McGonegal, Julie. “Thomas King’s Moment of Truth.” The UC Observer, Sept. 2013, http://www.ucobserver.org/culture/2013/09/moment_truth/.
“William Baziotes Biography, Art, and Analysis of Works.” The Art Story, http://www.theartstory.org/artist-baziotes-william.htm.
Hi Jenny,
Once again, great read!
I have a several questions about your story:
1. “There were a few people had lost interest in living and sacrificing for the long-term good..”
What did they need to sacrifice and why? If everybody was living in harmony then why was there a tension or animosity among the people?
2. “A bitter son had murdered his own father. ”
However evil has not come into the world yet in your story and neither did light or darkness so I was wondering how did these people survive? (also there wasn’t a sun and moon yet either?)
3. I’m confused because the spirits were separated because of their differences and became the sun and moon. However, humans need both to survive so technically doesn’t that mean they were still working together and not separated by differences?
4. You stated that your friends and family had “a particular admiration for the concept of how one of the spirits felt the right to establish a heaven on Earth.” That really defines or says something about the values of your loved ones. How do you read this admiration?
Lastly, you said that “it intrigues me that the Christian God is referred to as a “He” while there are some who may use “Her” pronouns instead (an act of feminism, I’m not sure).” I think this is an interesting read that’s relevant to the topic:
“https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jun/01/is-god-a-woman-miss-point-language-gender”
Let me know what you think 🙂
Cheers,
Chloe Lee
Hey Chloe. Thank you for your questions. I think I ended up being way too abstract about how the world came to be and completely disregarded the practical facts, whoops! I’ll answer them in the intention I had when I went about that way, if that makes sense.
1. I generally believe that harmony can be achieved despite differences in beliefs/opinions/perspectives. My thinking process was that once we can overlook these individual differences and think in an overall perspective, or live for this collective good itself–and assumed that was the ‘initial’ position of the universe. That being said, I probably should have used alternate “beings” in general than “humans,” haha.
2. Now going by the presumption that I’ve changed “humans” into “mortal beings” — I set the first case up so that it was extremely vague and makes you question why, and how. I guess my first assumption when writing this is that it was on accident, but then again, how would that happen as well? I hope my answering these questions clear things up a bit!
3. Referring to “humans” → “beings”. I think my general plan was because these so-called immortal spirits, who were the initial example of harmony itself as they can easily be merged as a higher entity… when they failed to continue as such, this first world fell apart and that’s how Earth was created. Now that I say these things, I realize I should probably change a few minor details so everything makes sense.
4. As those people I’ve told the story to are respectively Christian, I think that explains itself well. My story somewhat aligns with their beliefs as I do kind of set it up so that good came first, and then there was evil.
Thank you for sharing the link! The analogy with God and how meat tastes like chicken was interesting yet also pretty accurate. This quote “Yet our language, limited by fragile and feeble human brains, will never be enough to describe God, so we tie ourselves in knots, getting our knickers and Y-fronts in a twist when someone calls God ‘she’” — pretty much sums everything up. Once again, I hope I cleared some confusion up!
Best,
Jenny
Hey Jenny!
I liked your story! You did a great job writing it, and I thought it was interesting! Did you find that your story changed depending on who you told it to?
Hi Danielle,
Thank you! I definitely am not an eloquent storyteller, and when I did tell my story it was still a raw idea. I recall that I was able to tell the main idea of how evil came into this world by remembering how things changed in my story from the now that we live in. I feel that as I am reading and answering these comments (as well as the feedback from my audience) my story is changing within my head or really, making more sense to me and what I was essentially aiming for–that as our forms as humans were developing, evil also was born as life and humans were, too.
Hello Jenny,
I was impressed by your imagination which connects the birth of the moon/sun with the morality of evil/good. I also agree with one of listeners of your story who read the it as a metaphor that embodies the way you understand what is “black and white”. What struck me the most interesting in your story was the separation of the moon/sun which is caused by the conflicting understandings of a case of patricide. My question is: to what degree do you think this idea is influenced by the patriarchal discourse as opposed to your feminine consciousness of “desexing” the two main characters in your story? Primarily I am trying to figure out what factors have affected the way you create a Creation story and if those factors are to do with some fundamental issues.
Thanks,
Patrick
Hi Patrick!
Thank you once again for a thought-provoking comment. I think I tended to make my story rather abstract so some of my intentions might have been unclear? I actually didn’t think too much about the first case; I merely wanted it to be an example of some misunderstood incident (depending on how the reader sees it) so that’s why I had it as vague as it could have been. Instead of how Adam and Eve first sinned in the original Bible story by eating the forbidden fruit, I wanted my story to involve closer interactions with the people on the planet and with the Sun and the Moon.
Funny enough, while I was writing the story as a first draft, I came upon the subject of gender, and whether or not I should name both of the spirits. I caught myself calling the one who leans toward forgiveness a ‘her’ and tried to erase these presumptions I had about masculine and feminine notions by changing both to a non-gender. I feel that it’s far too common in classical stories, so I tried to be non-conventional and not set up any gender stereotypes. I guess my little accident with the patricide wasn’t supposed to imply anything, but I didn’t catch it! Perhaps I should have elaborated that it was a rather long case where both sides felt unjustified.
I hope I touched on everything you were asking!
-Jenny
Hello Jenny,
This semester, I’m also taking a course on Children’s Literature (highly recommend it), and some of your story very much reminded me of elements and structures of a fairy tale. I think unintentionally it makes a great creation story about both the inception of our world we know today and evil itself. With King’s underlying message being how story’s make up who we are and how we approach life, what message do you think your passing on to a younger audience with your story if they were read to it?
Best,
Lucas
Hi Lucas,
Thanks for your comment! I actually am taking a creative writing class as well. In regards to how this story may make up who I am – I’ve just generally thought it might be interesting to have more of a collective downfall – and I think to younger audiences this can teach them about cooperation and community on a greater level, as well as the consequences from a lack of responsibility, perhaps. I am not sure how much of the philosophy would get into their minds, but it would be cool if they understood the general gist that not all actions have purely good nor evil intentions. Overall, I think I would make 2 further notes: that selfishness can be both a good (in taking care of yourself) and a bad thing (if you don’t consider others), and 2) it’s important to recognize your own impact on others.
Cheers,
Jenny