(from 11/3/15)
Pretender: fake, faux, phony (I wonder if phony is the diminutive for faux), inauthentic, liar, fibber. Fake it till you make it. Let's play pretend. Make Believe Land. Fantasy Island, The Love Boat. Which of these things doesn't belong? Is it the pretender or everyone else? Or is everyone pretending to some extent, or less? Shakespeare famously claimed that all the world's a stage and that we are merely players, actors, pretenders.
Why do we pretend? What if we don't pretend, what then? Are we too boring or scared or sad or angry or lonely?
Just today on the radio, Sandra Cisneros said stories are like medicine and the stories we go to again and again are the ones that have the ability to heal us. In storytelling we pretend. We make up exotic characters, fantastical beasts, catapulting them into wondrous worlds, to clamber over obstacles unknown. Might victory be hidden in pretending?
No comments:
Post a Comment