There is a shiny red apple filled with poison and a crone with eyes like steel. There is a virginal girl as pure as snow, a sleep like death, and a kiss that wakes her into a new life of Happy Ever After.
This tale has survived from ancient times because it was always more than just entertainment. It was an instruction for living.
We’re moving into a new age now, one of unparalleled and accelerating technological change. Every aspect of our existence is being transformed. Hang around in the coffee shops and bars and you will catch murmurs of unease. Old friends are vanishing by the day. Familiar, comforting ways of doing things lost. Nowhere seems safe.
Never has there been a more important time for stories that instruct and guide and explain. A new narrative for a new age.
Very interesting article. Thanks for writing it. But, do you have something against science fiction? I understand admonishing writers to stay up with the times and write to the not too distant future.
But, my goal is to take us beyond this transition moment to a much better future. I believe people need to once again hope the future can be brighter by seeing it come to life onscreen.
I believe humanity has evolved into the consciousness of this living being we call Earth and our art is how she dreams. Time has come to dream of what we want to create here. Right now sci fi/horror portrays our dreams of the future as mostly nightmares.
However, I’m currently typing this on a “communicator” envisioned by the artists who created Star Trek in the 1960s. They imagined such technology existing 300 years in the future.
But, engineers were inspired by the artists who imagined this technology to produce flip phones within 30 years. Motorola gave the first flip phone to none other than William Shatner.
I imagine the world of justice and peace we can build here, because it’s spectacular! I believe we need visions of this world to inspire us to create it.
I agree with you. And no, nothing against SF. This piece was more about developing modern myths and stories that could explain the current transition.