I just slayed a dragon. Then I flew around the Earth and defeated China. That is, of course a lie. Why would I do that? Because in everything (especially literature) the truth is generally not as exciting as a fib. It is not a lie that attempts to detract from the truth, soiling its user with filthy guilt and unceasing moral decay, that I speak of, but the lies I tell every day to my friends to make them laugh. Did that hilarious coincidence happen or did something like it almost happen, and I merely chose to embelish the reality with a little "interest cusioning." It may not be that what I could have claimed happened, but in tweaking the facts of event, I can make people laugh at an otherwise pointless story, or enthrall people with the wonders of an amazing occurrence when, in actuallity, it never did occurr. When do we take these lies to be good? When is ever any lie, whether it has malice or entertainment as its intention, good?
I regret to say I cannot remember the name, but a movie with a lying old dying father and his son coming to terms with his father's death and the seemingly inability for the father to stop telling tall tales details the wonders of the imagination over the simplicity and uneventful nature of reality. Reality is only as real as we make it out to be. For all intents and purposes, lying makes things better in this manner; the truth may be more didactic, but the genuine interest in reality is minor in its appeal. Like Don Quixote, the world within a lie, even a delusional one, is far better than the norm. And, like Shelley, I would argue that a lie is even greater than the truth in that our sullen, sod-like sad state of this brazen world is far inferior to the would-be myth of the Illiad, graphic novels, faerie tales and other golden works of beautiful dissemblances.
I regret to say I cannot remember the name, but a movie with a lying old dying father and his son coming to terms with his father's death and the seemingly inability for the father to stop telling tall tales details the wonders of the imagination over the simplicity and uneventful nature of reality. Reality is only as real as we make it out to be. For all intents and purposes, lying makes things better in this manner; the truth may be more didactic, but the genuine interest in reality is minor in its appeal. Like Don Quixote, the world within a lie, even a delusional one, is far better than the norm. And, like Shelley, I would argue that a lie is even greater than the truth in that our sullen, sod-like sad state of this brazen world is far inferior to the would-be myth of the Illiad, graphic novels, faerie tales and other golden works of beautiful dissemblances.
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