Myth and Reality

Myth and Reality

Topic of Choice

April 6, 2015

Contrary to the common use of the word, myths, in a scholarly sense, are stories that capture fragments of truth. When brought together, these stories shape the consciousness and fundamental beliefs of a people. We are deeply shaped through the stories we hear and speak. Critical to the conversion of C.S. Lewis was a conversation with J.R.R. Tolkien on the nature of myth and metaphor. On a September night in 1931, the two Oxford scholars conversed over the “Christian myth.” Lewis was a man deeply committed to the sound reason of logic. It was Tolkien who opened his mind beyond the truth of Christianity to the meaning of Christianity. The meaning could only be found, however, by a suspension of reason and opening of the imagination. It is through a mystical, imaginative, intuitive vision of life that reality can perceived through myth. Narrative gives us language that lifts us to that which is “wholly other.” It invites us to step beyond the lines reason has allotted, out of the looking-glass and into a world of substance - reality. Films are myths that have the power to convey reality, through the synthesis of image and word. Every now and then I watch a film that jolts me out of my complacency and awakens something deep within my soul. Walking away from such an experience, I feel changed. Something has been born inside me. I realize I am an active participant in a beautiful story that is far grander than my own; yet nevertheless celebrated the small role I play in it.