Hello, hello, welcome back! It has…

Well. I can’t say I had a great couple of weeks off, all things considered. Still, I have vacated and now I am back so it’s time to get down to work. It’s time to talk about fiction and its purposes in our life, a topic which those who enjoy the creation and appreciation of fiction hold near and dear to our hearts.

However, I want to take look at it from a different direction. Generally the fiction aficionado loves talking about the creation of fiction, the care in construction, the integration of timeless truth with a transient narrative. The casual fictioneer looks at things differently.

That is not news. Anyone hardcore storyteller who has tried to discuss movies, TV or books with their casual friends has come to this conclusion. The structure and techniques of story rarely mean much to them. Yet if we want to be storytellers who can captivate a large audience we still need to understand why they look at stories the way they do.

That brings us to the topic of today’s post. Fiction as refuge is an idea I’ve been slowly coming to understand as I watch the gradual disintegration of the stories that formed the cultural zeitgeist for most of my life. This collapse of the narrative integrity of some of these tales is something I cared a great deal about. In this I was not alone. But over time I came to realize I didn’t look at the issue in the same way as many of my peers.

Again, this was not new to me. That’s the way things have been most of my life. Yet the reasons for these differences is something all storytellers need to grapple with, as I believe it is a significant part in what makes some stories last in the eyes of the public and others fade away.

I strongly believe that most people who appreciate fiction look to it as a place of refuge from the world.

Let me try to explain this using the classic TV franchise Star Trek as an example. The essence of Rodenberry’s vision of the future is that humanity would change and mature until they no longer suffered from internal strife and division. Instead, they would travel into the stars, using their newfound cooperation to learn, grow and conquer the stars.

Was this vision a bit naive? Hopelessly optimistic? At times painfully detached from reality? Certainly. However, when you are tired from the constant conflicts in life, slipping onto the decks of the starship Enterprise with your favorite crew to sort out some sort of nonsense science project without any of that drama is mighty appealing. You’re not looking for craftsmanship. You’re not seeking moral lessons or political insight. You just need to feel some sense of meaning with people you know and like. Fiction offers that.

Most fiction franchises rise or fall not on the strength of their plots or their twists or their moods. They stand on the strength of their characters. The crews of Star Trek are packed full of fun, relatable and memorable characters who often carried their TV shows through poor scripts and network hostility. The original cast won over audiences to the point that some of them survived the years after Star Trek was cancelled on the generosity of their fans. James T. Kirk, Spock and Leonard McCoy remain the measuring stick for effective ensemble casts to this day.

When Picard gathered the crew of the Enterprise-D together one more time fans rejoiced. It was a bit like slipping on an old, comfortable pair of slippers one last time. The comfort and relaxation provided by spending a little more time with long loved characters is a precious thing. The timeless nature of fiction makes it possible to find that respite at any time, even if all you can do is talk about stories with others who have enjoyed them with you.

Fiction’s power of refuge is special. It can be horribly misused, both by tearing down the elements of a story that offer shelter and by manipulating others through the way fiction lowers a person’s guard. Audiences can also be tempted to crawl into fiction and abandon reality entirely. None of that is healthy.

Yet, when the boundaries and purposes of fiction are properly respected, fiction as shelter is not just good, it is great. Don’t let the drive for that to replace all the other things fiction can do. Moral teaching, craftsmanship, timelessness, empathy and many, many other benefits come from fiction as well. It’s fine to work them into a warm, comfortable story. But if you want those other elements to reach as broad an audience as possible, studying your fiction as a source of respite may be the most important element of all.