Less than three months out from arguably the most important presidential election in living memory, our democracy is in deep, deep shit.
Need we recap? Commuting Roger Stone. Gassing Lafayette Square. Suppressing the vote. Sabotaging the Postal Service. Floating the postponement—and actively undermining the credibility—of the November election. Sending federal agents to detain (read: abduct) protestors in Portland. And that’s just a topline best-of-Trump-2020 compilation.
This is America?
Let’s face it: The spirit of nihilism that animates MAGA was never about making America great again so much as it was burning the Republic to the ground. That’s what Trump’s supporters really voted for in 2016, and it’s the one big (if never quite explicit) campaign promise he might actually deliver on: reifying the very American carnage he once claimed exclusive qualification to redress. To wit: The nightly news plays like an apocalyptic bookend to the rousing founding-of-America story told in Hamilton.
While Lin-Manuel Miranda’s revolutionary masterpiece certainly challenges us to appreciate anew the value and purpose of democracy—a timely reminder if ever there was one—it somewhat less conspicuously does the same for an equally imperiled institution: narrative itself.
Hamilton has been described by its creator as “a story about America then, told by America now” (Edward Delman, “How Lin-Manuel Miranda Shapes History,” The Atlantic, September 29, 2015). But if the musical’s creative approach to its subject matter is unorthodox, its narrative structure is very much a conventional hero’s journey. (For my Save the Cat! scholars, it’s a “Real-Life Superhero” tale, and not, as some “experts” would have you believe, Golden Fleece.) The power in and of narrative is a central preoccupation of Hamilton; the show literally opens with a dramatic question posed to the audience:
How does a bastard, orphan, son of a whore and a Scotsman, dropped in the middle of a forgotten Spot in the Caribbean by providence, impoverished, in squalor, Grow up to be a hero and a scholar?
Alexander Hamilton is a man who imagines—who writes—his way out of poverty, and, in turn, “rewrote the game,” by “Poppin’ a squat on conventional wisdom”—meaning, the institutionalized “divine right of kings” narrative.
For Alexander Hamilton, though, it isn’t enough to make his mark on the American narrative; he wants his own legacy—his own story—enshrined alongside it: “Don’t be shocked when your hist’ry book mentions me.” Both of those “inevitabilities,” along with the friendship of a few of the sons of liberty responsible for them, are inaugurated in the musical’s fourth number, the title of which explicitly evokes narrativity: “The Story of Tonight.”
Fully prepared to go down in a blaze of glory, if necessary, to ensure his legacy—“If they tell my story/I am either gonna die on the battlefield in glory or—/Rise up!”—mentor George Washington recognizes Hamilton’s value lies not in his command of troops, but his command of words; he wants Alexander writing, not fighting. And he’s not the only one who prizes both Hamilton’s life and his “skill with a quill”; as Eliza sings in “That Would Be Enough”:
If you could let me inside your heart Oh, let me be part of the narrative In the story they will write someday. Let this moment be the first chapter Where you decide to stay
What a fascinating creative choice Miranda made—to have all these characters view the events of their lives narratively. Casting the roles with performers of color and having them (to a large extent) rap the story of our country’s founding was Miranda’s act of artistic and cultural subversion, but by leaning into conventional narrativity—by bucking postnarrative trends and actually embracing traditional story arcs—he is in effect “saying that American history can be told and retold, claimed and reclaimed, even by people who don’t look like George Washington and Betsy Ross” (Lin-Manuel Miranda and Jeremy McCarter, Hamilton: The Revolution [New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2016], 95). He’s challenging our storytellers—not, it’s worth underscoring, story itself.
Having answered the question that opens the act—How did Hamilton grow up to be a hero and a scholar?—the surrender at Yorktown prompts a new dramatic imperative: “What comes next?/You’ve been freed./Do you know how hard it is to lead?”
I like to say that the Midpoint is the Grand Central Station of plot points, the nerve center. It’s because so many demands intersect here. The Midpoint clearly divides every story into two distinct halves and is the “no-turning-back” part of our adventure. We’ve met our hero and shown his deficiencies, we’ve sent him to a new place, and in Fun and Games we’ve given him a glimpse of what he can be—but without the obligation to be that! Now at the Midpoint, we must show either a false victory or a false defeat that forces the hero to choose a course of action, and by doing so, make his death and rebirth inevitable.
Blake Snyder, Save the Cat! Strikes Back: More Trouble for Screenwriters to Get Into… and Out of (Save the Cat! Press, 2009), 51
The narrative ellipsis that occurs between act breaks is self-consciously acknowledged via newly-returned-home Thomas Jefferson’s introductory number, the title of which is exactly what you or I might ask our theatergoing companion had we gotten up in the middle of a show to use the restroom: “What’d I Miss?”
Which is not to suggest Hamilton eschews all manner of narrative ambiguity the way our continuity-beholden mega-franchises do; rather, Miranda revels in the very subjectivity of storytelling in “The Room Where It Happens,” a Rashomon-style account of the Compromise of 1790, dramatizing the competing objectives of—and closed-door deals among—Hamilton, Madison, and Jefferson. “The Story was not a list of events on a historical timeline, in [director] Tommy [Kail]’s view, it was the emotional journey that Hamilton and the other key characters needed to make” (Miranda and McCarter, Hamilton: The Revolution, 206–07).
“One Last Time” directly addresses the aspect of storytelling absolutely antithetical, if not anathema, to corporate postnarrativity: endings. Washington makes his case for stepping aside, for voluntarily absenting himself from any further participation in the national narrative—for letting someone else get a chance to lead, and to bring new energy and ideas to the American experiment: “If I say goodbye, the nation learns to move on./It outlives me when I’m gone.”
Washington understands democracy can only thrive if it’s continuously infused with new blood, made to reflect the ethos and serve the needs of successive generations. Democracy, like narrativity, is designed to be sustainable—a renewable resource, if you like. But that means graciously ceding that resource, not hoarding it possessively. Part of the reason we’ve brought democracy to the brink is because, two decades into our new century, we’ve remained willfully mired in the culturally outmoded narratives of the previous one, from extractive capitalism to excessive force, from superheroes to Star Wars.
Such are the narratives the Greta Thunbergs and David Hoggs and Nupol Kiazolus of the new millennium threaten to overturn. Of course Generation Z is fed up with us—with our neurotic addiction to the comforting fictions of postwar Americana. That very frustration is the reason why Lin-Manuel Miranda himself, an Xennial, has recently been the subject of Gen-Z ire on TikTok, the demographic’s preferred postnarrative mode of expression:
Though Hamilton was viewed as transgressive in 2015, it’s important to note precisely who was deeming it as such: liberal, white, primarily rich ticket buyers. . . . Miranda may have broken boundaries by bringing hip-hop to Broadway (though he was not quite the first to do so), but he still did it within an establishment framework. “A lot of Gen Z-ers would rather dismantle the system rather than work within it. It seems like highlighting the Founding Fathers the way Lin-Manuel did is still very much working within the system,” says [Joseph] Longo, who sees Hamilton as “working within the boundaries of respectability rather than fully separating from them.”
EJ Dickson, “Why Gen Z Turned on Lin-Manuel Miranda,” Rolling Stone, August 4, 2020
Eliza Hamilton has a similar blow-up-the-narrative reaction—in a song aptly titled “Burn”—when she learns of her husband’s infidelity. She destroys all his letters, the written record of their love story, and formally renounces her part in his legacy:
I’m erasing myself from the narrative. Let future historians wonder How Eliza reacted when you broke her heart. You have torn it all apart. I am watching it Burn.
To be sure, narrative is going up in flames right now—and that’s not an altogether bad thing for democracy. Capitalism, colonialism, Randian individualism, white supremacy, Broken Windows policing, conservatism as compassionate and a patriotic bulwark against authoritarianism, the Judeo-Christian worldview of dominion over the earth, Make America Great Again—all of those have been exposed for the pernicious (and often fallacious) fairy tales they’ve always been.
Even Joe Biden, who previously campaigned on Obama-era nostalgia—he all but entered the race last autumn belting “What’d I Miss?”—has since soberly rebranded as “Build Back Better,” an olive-branch acknowledgment that “normal” isn’t anything we should aspire to reestablishing:
Was the violence against women normal? Was the anti-Black and anti-Indigenous racism normal? Was white supremacy normal? Was the homelessness growing on the streets normal? Were homophobia and transphobia normal? Were pervasive surveillance and policing of Black and Indigenous and people of colour normal? Yes, I suppose all of that was normal. But, I and many other people hate that normal. Who would one have to be to sit in that normal restfully, to mourn it, or to desire its continuance? We are, in fact, still in that awful normal that is narrativized as minor injustices, or social ills that would get better if some of us waited, if we had the patience to bear it, if we had noticed and were grateful for the miniscule “progress” etc … Well, yes, this normal, this usual, this ease was predicated on dis-ease. The dis-ease was always presented as something to be solved in the future, but for certain exigences of budget, but for planning, but for the faults of “those” people, their lack of responsibility, but for all that, there were plans to remedy it, in some future time. We were to hold onto that hope and the suspension of disbelief it required to maintain “normal.”
I’ve spent many days thinking about the current political situation. And I noticed with shock and a certain bitter laughter, that the people who espoused cutbacks, belt tightening, austerity, privatization, the people who made up the atrocious clause, “running the country like a business,” have been spun around 180 degrees. Where they advocated, over the last 30 or 40 years, shrinking the state they have now swiftly expanded it. Though they have not admitted to the failure of their ideas and austerity policies, they have virtually, though temporarily, overturned 40 years of shrinking the state’s responsibilities to people. You wonder what additional things might have been done that they previously said could not be done. For we have seen how quickly these hitherto impossible changes were ramped up.
Dionne Brand, “Dionne Brand: On narrative, reckoning and the calculus of living and dying,” The Star, July 4, 2020
In the wake of the pandemic and the murder of George Floyd, more of us are beginning to consider anew the potential for social progress that had previously (and interminably) been dismissed as too soon, too quixotic, too economically impractical. To expand our moral imagination of what’s possible. To envision a new normal: fairer, stabler, more just, more sustainable—in every way. During the Democratic primaries, Biden didn’t even make this environmental activist’s preferred-candidate Top Ten, but I’ll concede he’s since gotten with the program:
To Biden’s credit, he retooled his [climate] plan after becoming the presumptive nominee to include more ambitious goals and to emphasize racial- and environmental-justice issues. “Biden’s agenda is a tribute to the rising political power of climate activists like the Sunrise Movement and other progressive activists championing the Green New Deal,” says Maria Urbina, national political director at Indivisible, a grassroots advocacy group.
Jeff Goodell, “How Joe Biden’s Plan Could Be a Transformative Step to Addressing the Climate Crisis,” Rolling Stone, August 11, 2020
Hell, with the economic downturn throwing into harsh relief the idiocy of employer-based health care, maybe he’ll even loosen his sentimental hold on Obamacare—which was never anything more than a Band-Aid on a broken system—and champion Medicare for All? Biden stands as hope that even at age 77—and I say this as someone who’s been critical of him—it isn’t too late to challenge one’s moral imagination and envision new narratives:
Interrogating the stories we have long taken for granted is healthy, especially the comforting ones. When the narratives and mythologies still feel helpful and true, resolving to do more to live up to them is also healthy. But when they no longer serve us, when they stand in the way of where we need to go, then we need to be willing to let them rest and tell some different stories.
Naomi Klein, On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2019), 173–74
What Klein is calling for, and what Biden is poised to deliver on (provided we elect him then hold his feet to the fire), is what my mentor Vice President Al Gore calls a Sustainability Revolution. Largely owed to the tragedy of COVID-19, the consequences of which have incontrovertibly exposed our democracy’s systemic dysfunction, that story is now within reach. But we need the moral imagination (a term I learned from Mr. Gore) to envision that new narrative, and to inspire others to share our passion for it. “The Founding Fathers did the impossible twice in 10 years because they did it together: supporting, inspiring, challenging, and correcting each other” (Miranda and McCarter, Hamilton: The Revolution, 136).
The Founding Fathers, though imperfect men, possessed the moral imagination to ask why the ideals of the Enlightenment couldn’t be the principles of a functioning democracy. As someone recently pointed out to me, when the founders wrote the Declaration of Independence, they were speaking to a reality that did not yet exist—much the way the Green New Deal does.
Looking back now, success seems foreordained. It wasn’t. No colonists in the history of the world had defeated their mother country on the battlefield to win their independence. Few republics had managed—or even attempted—to govern an area bigger than a city-state. Somehow, in defiance of all precedent, Washington, Hamilton, and the other founders pulled off both.
Their deliriously unlikely success—first as soldiers, then as statesmen—tends to obscure the true lessons of the American Revolution. The past places no absolute limit on the future. Even the unlikeliest changes can occur. But change requires hope—in the case of both of those unlikely victories, the hope that the American people could defy all expectation to overcome their differences and set each other free.
ibid., 88; emphasis mine
Don’t you take heart from that? I do. Credit Hollywood of all godforsaken institutions for my optimism: My tortuous screenwriting career conditioned me to remain tenaciously undaunted in the face of long odds and the likelihood of disappointment. Hamilton demonstrates that both democracy and narrativity, those indispensable instruments of human civilization, give us reason to be pragmatically hopeful—to be hopeful agents of change in our own right—and even though both are endangered right now, we shouldn’t give up on either.
And I realize neither is perfect—democracy can be hacked; narrative can be abused—and it can be tempting to want to burn down both structures and start from scratch; such is the anti-establishment impulse both nihilistic MAGA enthusiasts and some understandably impatient Gen Z-ers have in common.
Speaking to the latter group as an empathetic, card-carrying democratic eco-socialist, I know there’s good reason to be wary that Biden’s yet another corporate Democrat making a bunch of empty campaign promises and nothing’s going to fundamentally change under his leadership. Hamilton acknowledges such justified mistrust in “The Room Where It Happens”:
COMPANY: The art of the compromise— BURR: Hold your nose and close your eyes. COMPANY: We want our leaders to save the day— BURR: But we don’t get a say in what they trade away. COMPANY: We dream of a brand new start— BURR: But we dream in the dark, for the most part. BURR, COMPANY: Dark as a tomb where it happens.
I get it. For the entirety of my lifetime—my earliest memories land squarely in Saint Reagan’s first term, hence the reason I reject my generation’s debilitating nostalgia for all-things eighties—we have been fed an endless diet of bullshit (from Washington and Hollywood alike) about “American exceptionalism” as wealth has been consolidated by an exclusive club of billionaires, men of color have filled our prisons while Wall Street robber barons steal with impunity, and carbon emissions have soared exponentially. Such is why we no longer trust our storytellers anymore—why we’ve given up on narrativity in recent years… and now we’re ready to do the same with democracy.
But as someone who’s spent his adult life studying storytelling, I know that when a promising narrative is not quite working, which is certainly true of the social contract at present, you boil it down to its conceptual lodestar by throwing out the adjunctive text that isn’t serving the central premise, and set to task rewriting—the unsexy part of the creative process that distinguishes the pros from the poseurs. Blowing up the narrative requires no imagination, moral or otherwise; it is, in fact, the amoral riposte of the tragically unimaginative. Even Eliza Hamilton comes to accept this—“I put myself back in the narrative” she sings in the show’s final number, “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story”—and consider all she accomplished in the half century following her husband’s premature death, least of which was securing Alexander’s legacy.
“Hamilton reminds us that the American Revolution was a writers’ revolution, that the founders created the nation one paragraph at a time” (ibid., 225). By re-envisioning the story of the founding of our democracy as a hip-hop musical, Hamilton joyously (and narratively) demonstrates our system of government is flexible—and built to adapt to changing realities.
If Biden is elected, there will be a lot of tough questions asked about how to make his plan a reality, especially at a time when the economy appears to be headed for the worst collapse since the Great Depression. But for now, it’s enough to say that Biden’s proposal, released in July, is by far the most ambitious climate agenda ever put forward by a presidential nominee. To experienced climate warriors the plan might look like a grab bag of old and new ideas, but its subtext is apparent: Dealing with the climate crisis is not just about eliminating carbon pollution, but reimagining every aspect of our world, including designing ways to protect the most vulnerable from the brutal impacts of heat, disease, fire, and rising waters. . . .
. . . And that means not just replacing gas-guzzlers with electric cars, but rethinking how cities are built, how political power is distributed, and rebalancing the relationship between labor and capital through unions.
Goodell, “How Joe Biden’s Plan Could Be a Transformative Step to Addressing the Climate Crisis,” Rolling Stone; emphasis mine
Like the founders nearly two and a half centuries ago—and the mere fact the democracy they established has lasted this long should bolster our faith in its durability—we are being challenged to turn the page on an antiquated narrative (in our case, the Reagan Revolution, a.k.a. the divine right of capitalism), to envision an egalitarian reality that does not yet exist and ask, “Why the fuck not?”
I mean, Christ: What storyteller worth his salt would throw away that shot?
Are you registered to vote? Have you pledged to vote? Do both here—and then get three friends to do likewise.
“Washington understands democracy can only thrive if it’s continuously infused with new blood, made to reflect the ethos and serve the needs of successive generations. Democracy, like narrativity, is designed to be sustainable—a renewable resource, if you like. But that means graciously ceding that resource, not hoarding it possessively.”
So true, Sean. Our system was made to evolve. I think the founders failed to imagine that we would fail so badly. They expected at least some basic morality and patriotism.
Biden’s narrative has changed and it’s encouraging. More of the same certainly isn’t going to work. We just need to get there.
Indeed, Diana.
By all evidence, the founders anticipated an authoritarian might someday make his way into the Oval Office, hence the reason they designed a system of checks and balances that includes independent institutions like the free press and congressional tools like impeachment. What they couldn’t have envisioned — and this isn’t indicative of a failure of imagination so much as a lack of divination — is a pervasive postnarrative media culture that can be expertly manipulated to erode all faith in objective reality itself:
Still, last night’s DNC opener stands as proof that morality and patriotism, like democracy and narrativity, are renewable resources. And I’m encouraged by the unity in the Democratic party — the fact that we’ve got Millennials (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez), Xers (Kamala Harris), boomers (Elizabeth Warren), and members of the Silent Generation (Sanders and Biden), of all different backgrounds and ethnicities and ideological positions on the liberal spectrum (from progressives to centrists), united in our belief in science, in a shared vision for America (even if we have different ideas about how to best achieve it), and in a sense of urgency (for both the country and the planet). We’re going to turn the page on the Trump era this November — and reform the systemic dysfunction that gave rise to Trumpism in the first place. Keep the Jeremy McCarter citation from the essay above close to your heart: “The Founding Fathers did the impossible twice in 10 years because they did it together: supporting, inspiring, challenging, and correcting each other.”
We will get there. I am hopeful — but hope requires action. This post is my (admittedly small) contribution to the cause. Thanks for reading — and supporting. Stay healthy and productive, my dear friend.
Your founding fathers would be roiling in their graves if they could see what’s happening right now. The Enlightenment has become The Dark Ages, complete with a plague. I admire your optimism and can only hope the narrative changes for the better in November!
Yes, this is a depressingly regressive time for a country that, by and large, made better decisions than other nations over the past 200 years by “harvesting the wisdom of the crowd,” as Vice President Gore says.
Still, in stark contrast with MAGA’s jingoistic nihilism, I am a pragmatic optimist, Suzanne. I in no way underestimate the immense power of stupidity that Trump has unleashed — that, for a large portion of the American population, he’s successfully equated ignorance with patriotism:
And American stupidity isn’t going away even if — big if — Trump is kicked to the curb in November. But just as Trump has provided a resounding model for wanton ignorance and mean-spiritedness, my hope is that Biden — who, for all of his shortcomings, is a genuinely empathetic human being — can inspire a new ethos of progressive imagination and sympathetic coexistence:
To that end, my patriotic duty in the months ahead is twofold: to embody that ethos in my own life to the fullest extent I can, and to do everything in my humble power to help get Biden elected — to help write a new narrative. The alternative is unthinkable.
Lots to digest here Sean. I follow US politics very carefully. And yes, like someone here said – the founding fathers must all be like on a rotisserie stick in their graves. I personally feel Biden and Kami can make great change – despite that fact they have their work cut out for them big time. First they have to get back in good graces with world leaders and get back in Paris Accord and NAFTA for a start. I do believe with Kami and Bernie at his side, Joe will bring universal healthcare like the rest of the free world has.
The worst part will be getting King Covid out of the WH as his madness and fear of jail will have him continue to jeopardize the lives of others as he squirms.
I just finished reading Mary Trump’s book. Just wow, such a sick emotionless, loveless, apathetic excuse for a human being who would most definitely sellout anyone who got in his way and the abonimable way he treats his own family. He has zero value for human life and that makes him a very dangerous man with too much power.
Hey, Debby! Thanks for reading the piece and leaving such a thoughtful comment.
I absolutely share your profound hope for a Biden/Harris administration, hence the reason I wrote this impassioned post! Biden has been handed a rarified historical opportunity to be a truly transformative president, much the way FDR was, and my hope is that he will rise to the moment. He’s a fundamentally decent human, but — as any environmental activist will tell you — Big Money always seems to have a way of stymieing progress, even when it seems inevitable. Still, given that this is the last office Biden will ever hold (provided he wins, of course), perhaps he’ll feel emboldened in a way younger presidents haven’t to stand up to Big Oil and Big Pharma and all the rest of the corporate lobbyists that buy the America they want. Our job — as citizens, activists, voters, all of the above — is to encourage him, and to hold him accountable.
But right now — and I say this to anyone who feels Biden doesn’t pass the progressive “purity test” — he is the only person in America who stands a chance of ridding us of Trump. He’s it — like it or not. So, we gotta vote for him… and then work with him over the next four years to get our house in order.
Here’s some good news: With the postponement of COP 26 from this November to next November, President Biden will be under pressure to arrive in Glasgow having already passed substantial climate legislation during his first year in office. So, we could have a de facto Green New Deal by this time next year!
I’m sure Mary Trump’s book is depressing as hell. I read Fire and Fury and Fear: Trump in the White House, but I haven’t read The Room Where It Happened or Too Much and Never Enough. At this point — for me, anyway — everything we need to know about Fat Donny we already know, and you either support him or you don’t. I’d be surprised if any of those books changed a single mind. Right now, it all comes down to getting that fucker out come November. And then Biden — and every truly patriotic American — has a lot of work to do…
Keep the faith, Debby! The opportunity for transformative change is nearly upon us…
One thing to remember about the postnarrativity revolution is that this is not the first revolution to hit the arts
Dadaism, Surrealism, Impressionism, Abstract, Modernism, New Wave, Free Verse, Punk, Hip Hop… I could easily add dozens more. The list goes on and on and on…
The pattern is usually the same: The Old Guard rails against it, claims it isn’t even really art; the Young Turks insist that it is the ONLY valid form of art, and that all the older works are worthless and should just be thrown away.
The first Young Turks are usually exceedingly skilled, even geniuses, who find the older form restrictive or played out. Then come the less skilled. Then come the imitators who can’t create anything original, the poseurs, the ones who gravitate to this new form because they lack the skill or the patience to work in the original form and hope this new form will disguise their incompetence, and the profiteers who care nothing about art in any form
The “rules” for this new form, hazy at first, get worked out, become codified, and eventually accepted, to the point where one is free to work in either form, or even mix the two
Then comes the next revolution
Hey, Dell!
The narrative arts are a continuum, for sure, with each novel permutation standing on the shoulders of what came before, giving new life to an old form. Hamilton to me is such an inspiring testament to that, synthesizing a host of disparate (and often incongruous) influences, from hip-hop to Harry Potter, from Sondheim to Sorkin, from the British invasion of the 1770s to the British Invasion of the 1960s.
In many respects, what Miranda did with Hamilton isn’t entirely different from what Lucas did with Star Wars: He brought us into a funhouse fantasy unlike any we’d ever seen before, and managed to awe us without disorienting us — by taking his audience on a classic hero’s journey through an idiosyncratically visionary world. The aesthetics in both instances were revolutionary, but the underlying story structures had a familiarity that made us feel (if only subconsciously) that we were in the hands of master storytellers. The artistic genius of both Hamilton and Star Wars is that they are simultaneously conventional and unconventional — that’s where their immense power comes from. It’s no surprise both writers are dutiful students of storytelling craft, even if their demographic cohorts and personal backgrounds and preferred mediums couldn’t be more dissimilar.
I am a huge supporter of creative experimentation — it’s the only way we produce culturally defining works like the aforementioned, even if it sometimes begets well-intentioned misfires (Lucas’ prequel trilogy, for instance) and inspires hackneyed imitations (remember all the too-cool crime thrillers released in the years following Pulp Fiction, like Things to Do in Denver When You’re Dead and 2 Days in the Valley?). Cubism (Picasso, Braque), absurdist theater (Beckett, Stoppard), metafictional horror (Wes Craven’s New Nightmare and Scream) — all honored and challenged their artistic antecedents. The one-two punch of Alan Moore’s Watchmen and Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns in 1986 is largely — and, arguably, appropriately — credited with transforming superheroes from simplistic children’s entertainment to “sophisticated” adult literature, not only through their dark themes, but even their prestige-format presentations. (Though I would contend both stories — particularly Watchmen — make a subversive case against the unexamined lionization of costumed vigilantes, but that’s an argument I’ve made and lost many times over.)
For reasons I hope I made clear in the post above, I think the collapse of narrativity has been, on balance, a good thing for democracy. Smartphone videos of police brutality disseminated on postnarrative platforms (Twitter, Instagram, TikTok) have shattered some very old, institutionalized, and pernicious narratives. The capitalist and colonialist narratives haven’t worked for a lot of people in a long time, hence the rise of postnarrative modes of expression that are now exposing the way story has been abused to keep wealth and power consolidated among the privileged few.
(Sidebar: Corporate postnarrativity, it’s worth noting, isn’t a mode of expression, but rather a mode of marketing. Game of Thrones isn’t postnarrative fiction, just bad writing. I admittedly never liked that show from the beginning — though I endured the sadomasochistic experience of watching the entire series — but there have been plenty of other superficially postnarrative shows I’ve adored, perhaps none more so than Orphan Black. But even OB got lost in the rabbit hole of its own labyrinthine mythology after a while, and the thought-provoking fun of the first few seasons was all but quashed by the resolve-the-conspiracy mandate of the last few. What a better, and certainly more meaningful, show OB would’ve been if Manson and Fawcett had made no attempt to explain the clones, and, accordingly, no implicit promises of a “resolution” that — let’s face it — could only be a letdown. If they had dialed down the de rigueur sci-fi thriller aspects of the premise in favor of a more grounded dramatic series with the admittedly fantastical conceit of all these unexplained doppelgängers discovering one another’s existence, they could have exploited the very provisional type of storytelling that is the essence of true postnarrativity. Instead, Orphan Black‘s rich themes of sisterhood, identity, nature versus nurture, and bodily autonomy were given secondary consideration to the more fashionable imperative of expansive world-building and empty-promise puzzle-boxing. Pity.)
But with the unfolding global revolution catalyzed by postnarrativity — as a mindset, I mean, and not necessarily a storytelling form — I hope we use this historic opportunity to reclaim democracy as well as conventional narrativity, restoring the integrity of both in the years to come. I think, given the moment, it would behoove us to refamiliarize ourselves with the “old rules”… if for no other reason than to establish some new ones. To that end, I’ll be making mythic structure the subject of next month’s post…
Hope you’re well, my friend. As always, I appreciate your contributions to these conversations.
Sean