Bamboozled by the Storyteller

I was introduced to the character of Scheherazade, perhaps the most famous storyteller of all time, by way of music.  As a preface to her playing of Rimsy-Korsakov's gloriousScheherazademusic on our piano, my mother told me about this woman whose life depended upon her storytelling skills.  Scheherazade's motivation for telling stories had the compelling aura of exoticism that seemed lacking in the flat, bland Midwest where I was growing up. Thankfully, I knew little then about mental or physical abuse. I had not yet met anyone deformed by fear and rage. The very real stories of queens beheaded for not producing male heirs felt like fiction to me.  Therefore, Scheherazade's king, a character so enraged by one betrayal that as a prevention he ordered the murders of his own virgin brides after the wedding night, was far-fetched fantasy to me then.  

Despite King Sharyar's bad record, Scheherazade was confident in her ability to create tales that would literally save her life.  She did this in a storytelling marathon of one thousand and one nights before the king pardoned her.  It occurs to the adult me, that THIS is the kind of storyteller our human culture needs now - someone who can stop our current destructive behaviors by creating stories compelling enough to stop us in our tracks, re-arrange our priorities, and set us on a sustainable path of respect for each other and our entirely living planet. 
below:  Springtime In The Bamboo Garden ©Joy Kreves 2005

 Origins of words, the storyteller's tools, are often very interesting to me.   The word "bamboozled" implies the comedic attitude of slapstick, but it apparently derives from the word "bamboo", because one can get so lost, so disoriented in a bamboo forest.  I have tasted the terror of being lost in the maze at Cawdor Castle in Scotland at about 15 minutes before the 5pm grounds closing time, so the idea of finding oneself lost in a bamboo forest, or a midwestern cornfield, for that matter, holds no humor for me.  You can innocently wander into such a maze and a few steps later find yourself completely disoriented, lost, and trapped.  Scheherazade's husband had his plot all drawn out and she was written in to be just another victim in his story.  If it weren't for her supreme achievement of bamboozling him she wouldn't be a famous character today.  Neither she nor her story would have been projected into her future.  Her future, which is now our present, is where she and her tale exist.  Humans all over the earth have been bamboozled by the stories of our society's military-industrial complex, of our corporations, and of our religions.  We have been consciously and cleverly told that we our very purpose as humans is to dominate the landscape and be a voracious consumer!  The Story of Stuff couldn't put it more clearly.  We've been bamboozled.


The tale that tramples all life on earth includes a new chapter in which the United States Supreme Court concluded that a corporation has equal rights to an individual.  That is but one example of a tale that must be rewritten to recognize the difference between life forms and manmade economic structures.  Our new story will have the following premise:  we are living beings existing on a living planet and we cannot exist on a non-living structure.  Now my father was always telling us as we grew up, "You make your bed, then you must lie in it".  Now I can ask, "Why?  Why must we lie in the wrong bed once we realize a mistake has been made?"  I have to believe we can change our circumstances when we find ourselves in need of something better.

Last week, I was privileged to have the opportunity to hear Miriam MacGillis, the founder of Genesis Farm in Blairstown, NJ. speak to some students.  Miriam, a former artist, a Dominican nun and farmer, spoke of our desperate need for a new cultural story about our human place in the earth's life.  She urges us all to work hard to create a story that embraces scientific knowledge to achieve a shift of power between life forms, and thus save our lives.  Our old and current Judeo-Christian story, that humans are a God-favored, superior life form to all others on the earth has gotten us onto a path of gross destruction.  Let us plant our new deciduous forests with clear landmarks along paths of life-sustaining stories.  Let us recycle those old bamboo forests in order to disorient the old storytellers and their enraptured audiences while we gain time for our new, life-sustaining stories to take hold.

On a cultural level humans have stories to situate ourselves on planet earth.  For centuries now we have been enthralled by the story that we are God's favorite creation, and all other life forms were made for our disposal.  In our current story the environment exists to be exploited by us, for our pleasure.  It has been a well supplied department store.  Increasingly now those store shelves are showing empty spaces.  Like a raging spouse, our habitual beating up of our environment has left scars which cannot be "fixed" by an apology.  Once we have driven the SUV over the metaphoric flowers neither an individual's nor a corporation's crocodile tears and promises will do the job. Healing (if it is still possible) requires an entirely new and sustainable mindset with an understanding of what the consequences of our actions really are.  Life is fragile. 
below:  Fragile Life ©Joy Kreves 2006

We humans have disrupted weather patterns.  Our activities are melting glaciers.  Our mining of resources has stripped huge areas of beautiful ecosystems, leaving nothing but bare, dead swathes of earth where nothing can live.  These are the facts.  I am part of this culture, and I don't know what to do.  I am an artist, and I have to fit my art into this backstory or fit this backstory into my artwork because it is so relevant.  Being an artist is a responsibility and I'd like my art to do more than add more material stuff to our already overstuffed planet. So far the only way I can figure out how to be a constructive part of the new story is by letting myself be a filter for all of these ideas and trusting that something worthwhile will come out in my work.  

We all need tools to work with.  It is interesting to learn that the English language is sadly lacking in the very vocabulary with which to describe our human relationships with our environmental home.  How can a storyteller create without the language?  Trans-disciplinary philosopher Glenn Albrecht  has been working to correct that lack by creating words that are quickly catching on.  One of them, "Solastalgia", inspired my new art installation about my relationship with the endangered Delaware River.  
below:  Solastalgia, ©Joy Kreves 2010

I am a firm believer in the concept of micro/macro.  As things go on a micro level of existence, so do they go when looked at through a macro lens, and all the levels in between. The Arabian Nights is a success story, not only because it was supremely entertaining but because it saved Scheherazade's life.  As resources disappear and climate changes create havoc, many people are beginning to realize that our earth's life is severely endangered, and that it will take a new story about our human position on earth to literally save our own necks.  Who will be a powerful enough storyteller to create a new story- one that enough humans will embrace as enthusiastically as Sheherazade's King Shahryar, thus saving the lives of us all?  
Events not even a week old can be expertly shaded and re-rendered by a talented storyteller in a way that transforms them into an entirely new version of history. The storyteller can even achieve a complete reversal of power between the various characters.  I have witnessed firsthand the power of an accomplished storyteller to bamboozle someone else into believing that they were the cause of a spectacularly destructive rage.  In this kind of story all of King Shahryar's virgins were at fault for their very potential to deceive.  I have seen BP executives move their lips in apology over that disastrous (and preventable) environmental assault.  I have witnessed it in today's politicians who speak the spin that serves their own purposes at the expense of all the rest of us.  Therefore, I believe it is possible that some person(s) with positive intentions to help us all could harness their most powerful storytelling skills and spin all humans towards a sustainable future.  The earth is already spinning.  Our story has to spin in the truth of that harmony.  What we humans on earth need NOW, is a new, more truth-embracing and life-sustaining story of ourselves, because our current story is an express train to oblivion.  Our living earth stage cannot sustain us as the characters we have been playing since the Judeo-Christian story took hold. As my new wise friend Miriam MacGillis says, "we have to try, for we have no choice."  So - will our new Scheherazade please stand up?  For us all?