Category Archives: Narrative

Winter Comes to Water As Well As Land: Gene Wolfe’s “The Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories”

Posted on Tuesday 14 March 2017 by Mark R. Kelly

Gene Wolfe, “The Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories” (1970) (~15 pp) Winter comes to water as well as land, though there are no leaves to fall. The waves that were a bright, hard blue yesterday under a fading … Continue reading →

Posted in Narrative, science fiction, Short Fiction | Comments Off on Winter Comes to Water As Well As Land: Gene Wolfe’s “The Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories”

Founding Father Thomas Paine and the Bible

Posted on Friday 8 April 2016 by Mark R. Kelly

I haven’t subscribed to Free Inquiry magazine for years, but I picked up the latest issue last week and was fascinated by a piece about Thomas Paine, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, whom the modern religious … Continue reading →

Posted in Bible, Narrative | Comments Off on Founding Father Thomas Paine and the Bible

Links and Comments: Narrative; the Limits of Rationality

Posted on Saturday 23 January 2016 by Mark R. Kelly

I seem to have not yet mentioned yet another essay about how narrative is taking over the world. James Murdoch (CEO of 21st Century Fox) a couple weeks ago in Time Magazine: Storytelling—both fiction and nonfiction, for good and for … Continue reading →

Posted in Narrative, Science | Comments Off on Links and Comments: Narrative; the Limits of Rationality

Links and Comments: Conspiracy Theories, Cognitive Biases; Changing Minds; All Stories

Posted on Friday 8 January 2016 by Mark R. Kelly

Catching up on links and comments from this past week. First, a couple book reviews in last Sunday’s NY Times Book Review. First, a review by Adrian Chen of Suspicious Minds: Why We Believe Conspiracy Theories, by Rob Brotherton. Subtitle: … Continue reading →

Posted in Changing One's Mind, MInd, Narrative | Comments Off on Links and Comments: Conspiracy Theories, Cognitive Biases; Changing Minds; All Stories

The Yearning for the Golden Past

Posted on Thursday 31 December 2015 by Mark R. Kelly

The Conservative Grand Narrative, according to Jonathan Haidt (mentioned in my discussion of his book The Righteous Mind in this post) is about “the struggle to return to a golden past” — a theme we hear echoed in Republican presidential … Continue reading →

Posted in Conservative Resistance, Culture, Narrative, Politics | Comments Off on The Yearning for the Golden Past

The Narrative of Narratives

Posted on Monday 28 December 2015 by Mark R. Kelly

A couple of years ago, when I read David McRaney’s second book, You Are Now Less Dumb, with its long section about human beings’ ‘narrative bias’, in which everything must be understood as some kind of story, this was a … Continue reading →

Posted in Narrative, Science | Comments Off on The Narrative of Narratives

John Crowley on Narrative

Posted on Friday 11 December 2015 by Mark R. Kelly

From the November issue of Harper’s magazine, a lovely essay on narrative by [the acclaimed sf/fantasy author] John Crowley: A Ring-Formed World. It begins (my bold): I have recently developed a crank theory, for which I can adduce no real … Continue reading →

Posted in Narrative | Comments Off on John Crowley on Narrative

Links and Comments: Bruni on Cruz; Flip-flopping presidents are most effective; political persuasion; Republicans’ economic narrative; Lisa Randall, a new Trek

Posted on Thursday 19 November 2015 by Mark R. Kelly

From last Sunday’s New York Times: Frank Bruni on Ted Cruz’s Laughable Disguise He emphatically recalls how his father’s embrace of Jesus Christ led him back to his mother — and to him — after his parents had separated. He … Continue reading →

Posted in Narrative, Politics, Psychology, Science | Comments Off on Links and Comments: Bruni on Cruz; Flip-flopping presidents are most effective; political persuasion; Republicans’ economic narrative; Lisa Randall, a new Trek

Narrative vs Reality

Posted on Tuesday 3 November 2015 by Mark R. Kelly

Another post about Republican politics — because, cf. Heinlein, this is currently the greatest threat to the advancement of American society. Trump is a buffoon; Carson a mild-mannered religious zealot; Cruz an megalomaniac, evangelical religious zealot; Christie a political clown; … Continue reading →

Posted in Narrative, Politics | Comments Off on Narrative vs Reality

Links and Comments from Today’s New York Times: 25 Oct 2015

Posted on Sunday 25 October 2015 by Mark R. Kelly

You can’t escape human nature: Norway Has a New Passion: Ghost Hunting. As traditional religion has faded in many northern European nations, it’s being replaced in Norway by an increased tendency to perceive ghosts at every corner. Ghosts, or at … Continue reading →

Posted in Conservative Resistance, Culture, Evolution, Narrative, Religion, Science | Comments Off on Links and Comments from Today’s New York Times: 25 Oct 2015