A story, once told, has as much reality as a piece of embroidery or a painting. Myths, bearing within them the very essence of eternal truths, make up the core of our existence. The fabric of legend surrounds us every day like coats of many colors that we can no longer see or feel for their very familiarity. We move through landscapes of myth with the heedless nonchalance of treasure-house guards accustomed to treading upon a rainbow of precious stones in the course of their daily work. And yet the beauty and the color are there to be seen by any who are willing to look and see. A good storyteller is one who can somehow touch these myths and bring them to renewed life in his tale. (from the afterword to The City of Refuge)
I remember a Career Day at my high school years ago, when a writer was engaged to speak to a classroom full of kids. She told of what it was like to be a writer, specifically a novelist. I sat there and listened to her, and I was too shy to say that I was writing stories (I was, too; I had written two in longhand, one of them rather thick). She fussed over a more forward student who admitted to being a writer.
Sean´na`chieA bard among the Highlanders of Scotland, who preserved and repeated the traditions of the tribes; also, a genealogist
I remember reading a woman’s account of her mother teaching her some songs and saying ‘You’ll need this some day’, as though the songs would help her to cope with whatever life deals out. She said that it had.
I can attest to that. I was listening to The Mary Ellen Carter, a song written by Stan Rogers about the wreck of a ship. It had been recorded by an Irish group of pub singers (and darned good they were, too!), and I was enjoying the tale of the ship, how she was wrecked, and how the remnants of her crew determined to bring her back (‘make the Mary Ellen Carter rise again’).
And then I heard the last verse:
…And the laughing, drunken rats who left her to a sorry grave
They won’t be laughing in another day. . .
And you, to whom adversity has dealt the final blow
With smiling bastards lying to you everywhere you go
Turn to, and put out all your strength of arm and heart and brain
And like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again.Rise again, rise again – though your heart it be broken
And life about to end
No matter what you’ve lost, be it a home, a love, a friend.
Like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again.
How many of us read a novel and get something from it aside from a moment’s entertainment? I know I do. (Heck, I’ve taken away some pretty profound lessons from Disney’s cartoon The Emperor’s New Groove – watch it and you may see what I mean!)
We write our books (most of us) to entertain people. I am still blown away when I see that someone shelled out cash to read something I ‘made up out of my own head’, but maybe that’s just my oddness. Our creativity is fueled by everything around us – whether stories our grandparents told us or myths we have heard or things we have read. When I talk to people about what they have read, that I have written, and what they have gained from reading it, I am left feeling a little breathless.
Perhaps I, too, am a seannachie.
dianawilderjottings 