More Life-Supporting Illusions for the New Year!
Magic of Story was only born 10 days ago, but is already on its way into a brand new year. I am sure 2014 has a lot of gifts in store for all of us. I would like to add my contribution to the season of new year’s gifts and resolutions.
I recommend reading two books that I believe compliment each other wonderfully and would be a fantastic read for all storytellers and storylovers, writers and readers, students and enthusiasts of mythology, psychology, spirituality, history…….. This duo may be the eye-opening inspiration you’re looking for in 2014!
First is one of my inspirations for creating Magic of Story: Joseph Campbell’s ‘Myths to Live By’. Campbell talks about symbolic forms that support their civilizations. He says, in the absence of these symbolic forms we have uncertainty and disequilibrium; what we need is life-supporting illusions, without which ‘there is nothing secure to hold on to, no moral law, nothing firm.’
Dostoyevsky’s ‘The Dream of the Ridiculous Man’ perfectly represents Campbell’s notion of life-supporting illusions, where a dream -a perfect little story in itself- literally supports the life of its protagonist by giving him what we all want: a vision and a quest. This little story is not only a textbook demonstration of story structure and archetypes, but also proves Campbell’s idea that life withers in the absence of stories.
I wish for more of these artfully told life-supporting illusions for the new year.
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The new year’s gift that I received this year is this website. Magic of Story is the fruit of the work of a few people, whom I’d like to thank here: David Dalla Venezia for giving me permission to feature his paintings, which, to me, beautifully represent the inner workings of the birth of stories; Layton Creative for the intuitively simple and sophisticated logo design; Sprinkler’s Nathan Shanahan for the web design and development and for his incredible patience in responding to my endless doubts and questions; Sprinkler’s Mary Cameron for her insightful editing; Can, Erol and Deniz for writing the first testimonials and my friends and family who contributed with their feedback and support.
Thank you all for your help and encouragement to realize this dream of mine. I hope 2014 will bring magic to all your endeavors.