A Constant Trembling of Truth — The Nitty-gritty of Narrative

A rumbling sometimes too quiet to hear, a trembling foundation, constant — like the Earth's movements far underground — human behaviour gets reconciled.

In my office work, I reconcile bank statements: purchases and sales. They must be relevant within the nature of the business, and be reconciled accordingly. Or do they? Creative accounting can occur. It shouldn't (and I don't do it) but it can happen. For example, I shouldn't buy a foot-spa for the cabinetmaking business if it is actually for myself (to probably use once, and then put into a cupboard). I could do it, and say it's a purchase for the employees to use at lunchtimes for wellbeing — and that would be a construction of narrative to suit my action in order to make it reconcilable. Humans reconcile their behaviour to varying degrees all the time! We lie to ourselves, we lie to each other. Some people, more than others.

People on Polygons

A polygon is a many-sided shape. If a behaviour is at the centre of a 3D polygon, the outer-sides represent people affected. The action looks different, depending on who you are and how you look at it. Even when people don't fabricate stories to justify actions, but speak the 'truth,' their 'truth' can be different to someone else's.

When tectonic plates rub and the earth trembles, grains of sand shift; when humans act, their behaviour rubs against other lives, and connections shift — a lot, or a little. People can end up on opposite sides of a polygon.

Moral Shortfalls Make Great Stories

The stories we write and read require friction — a problem — and characters with flaws (ideally):

What is the problem?

Where is the tension?

How is it resolved?

How do characters change over the course of the story?

Readers get to dive in and explore blurry morals and varying points of view — all constructed from different experiences of environment, society and culture.

Reading literature expands empathy. Character's lives can be tried on. A book is a safe place to wear other hats and other pairs of shoes. When the writing is skillfull, even the most uncomfortable of lives can be delved into and pondered.

Then, the question is:

Has the reader changed? Did they hop around on the polygon and end up somewhere else?

A few grains of sand here, a few grains of sand there, and a foundation has moved. Written story, oral story, our neighbour's story — getting to the heart of a shifting truth — by reading, listening, and reconciling.

I recommend reading the Miles Franklin Award winning novel The Yield by Tara June Winch. The power of this novel, I believe, is due to the crafting of three narrative voices, each with their own character arc, separate from, but connected to each other, across time.

Another good read is the well researched, own-voice, thought-provoking book Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Change the World by Tyson Yunkaporta. Here, in conversational style, academia meets First Nation's knowledge, and imagination. Truths are explored, in time, where they wriggle and wrap in non-linear, ever-present ways, shifting thinking for a better, fairer, and more sustainable future.

Image by S. Hermann & F. Richter from Pixabay

#blacklivesmatter #TheYield #TaraJuneWinch #empathythroughstory #novelwriting