Legends
December 21, 2011 - 7:07pm
and I'm not talking about trolls
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I learn so much from my kids. My five year old and his friend asked about the word "legend" today. What makes a legend different from a story or fairytale? are legends real? why don't we consider zombies legends? I hadn't thought too much about such things. I gave them a few examples - Big Foot, the legend of Sleepy Hollow, the legend of Newroz. They suggested I do some research and get back to them.
(As a sidenote, may I suggest adding the tag option of "Zombie"? That's a subject that seems to generate interest around here.)
Interesting. I think to qualify something as a legend it would have to have an element of possibility? Although no one has actually seen Bigfoot, grainy photos notwithstanding, there is enough circumstantial evidence to indicate it could be possible.
A fairytale would have no doubt about it's purely fictional content.
But, there's no hard rule cause we can talk about the "legend of Paul Bunyan", a giant with a giant axe who chopped down entire forests. Oh, and he had an ox named Blue.
I don't think plausibility is really a factor. More important is that people have been talking about the story in question as if it were true for a really long time, even if it's ludicrous (Paul Bunyan being an excellent example (and his ox was named Babe, by the way)). Ghost stories will always be legends because they can't be proven or disproven, so they just linger on and on, and the tellers themselves may not believe them, but since it's still talked about then it remains "The Legend of the Faceless Bride" or whatever. Unicorns and dragons are just fairytales since nobody even tries to pretend those things are true anymore (though in the middle ages they were legends). I think a legend is more about what makes a good story that people like to keep telling.
Here's an interesting article on the differences between legend, myth, folklore, and fairy tale. I never really thought about it before, but it's true, the concepts definitely overlap. Or, if the concepts don't overlap, the examples of each definitely could, in that you could argue that a certain story could be considered to fit into more than one of those categories.
On the other hand people use the word Legendary to refer to people or events that are indisputably real. Like the legendary musician Jimi Hendrix or the legendary fight between Ali and Frazier, although certainly refering to something or someone in the present as legendary would sound weird.
But in that context legend and legendary have different meanings. Legend implies an element of unprovability, and legendary invokes "merely" a sense of a one time greatness, never seen before or since, but definitely real.
Then there are historical myths and urban legends - things which most people assume are true, but are in fact false.
But, there's no hard rule cause we can talk about the "legend of Paul Bunyan", a giant with a giant axe who chopped down entire forests. Oh, and he had an ox named Blue.
I thought his name was "Babe" and he was blue.
I've always been interested in legends myths and folklore.
I've always been interested in legends myths and folklore.
Now would you be the shill for coca cola or the Turkish monk who used to throw dowery money through people's windows?
Usama bin Laden and al-Qaeda are legends created by the U.S. Gov't. This popular legend is described in Jason Burke's book, "Al-Qaeda: Casting a Shadow of Terror" (Penguin Books, 2004). Even the right wing think tank for the US Military, Rand Corporation, referred to Al-Qa'eda as "a notion."
Al-Qaeda has been described by cold warriors as a highly organized and technologically advanced terrorist threat. And the myth of an invisible army of darkness has replaced the vastly over-stated cold war enemy previously known as the World Communist Conspiracy. The political right have created a number of conspiracy theories in the past and all of them absurd. When they run out of enemies to justify propping-up military dictatorship, they simply invent invisible armies of darkness to threaten the public with. Creating a false sense of fear and overall strategy of tension is their game since WW II.
Thank you Fidel, for steering this fanciful discussion back on track. Certainly Cindarella or Tom Thumb cannot compare in legendary form to the contemporary heroes/anti-heroes of Osama bin laden et al, including link references, fantastic.
God forbid someone may have mentioned Shrek.
Then there are historical myths and urban legends - things which most people assume are true, but are in fact false.
I heart snopes.com
Then there are historical myths and urban legends - things which most people assume are true, but are in fact false.
I heart snopes.com
Yup. Me too. Shouldn't surf without it.
Ali vs. Frazier and Al' Queda. Two perfect examples of what I'm talking about. These are stories that get told and retold and come to life through the constant telling. That's what makes them legends. Legends are stories that got up and walked because they were so good people wanted to believe in them. It doesn't matter if they are easily verifiable facts, or plausible but unprovable theories, or just fantastic nonsense. Legends aren't defined by any of these things. They are defined by the reality that they gain when people choose to believe in them or to spread belief in them. This elevates them from the mere tale to something else, something that's not true but refuses to lie down and admit that it's false.
Yes, exactly. I think more people are still discussing Ali-Frazier today than an invisible army of darkness.
We were led to believe that the invisible threat was a well organized army of high tech terrorists holed up in massive concrete bunkers filled with global telecommunications equipment, a massive Dr Strangelove type war room, and possessing stockpiles of WMD. In fact, none of that was ever discovered anywhere close to Tora Bora or anywhere else in the world. I think the cold warriors may have confused the former Soviets with their wildest of dreams of today about a new and formidable army of evol empire, "Al-Qa'eda" plotting and scheming America's destruction, which cold war hawks created in their own feeble minds.
Whereas we can all verifty for ourselves that the Ali-Frazier fights actually took place in exact geographical-physical locations on the planet with dates and times and real people in attendance. These are facts which are neither blurred nor obscured for us, whereas the legend of Al-Qaeda will always require repetition by bought and paid-for leaders giving squawking open air oratories in order to prop-up another big lie, which is the perceived need for over-bloated militaries and "black budgets" off limits to Congressional and public scrutiny the same as their imaginary enemy is off limits to public scrutiny, "Al-Qa'eda."
ETA:
Even in death, Ali and Frazier will have actual resting places marked by physical grave markers in exact locations for all the world to know.
Not so with legendary Al-Qaeda leaders and Japanese film serpents alike representing the embodyment of evil, like Godzilla etc, who are typically banished to the sea for ever and ever at the tail ends of such tall tales.
If the mythical Godzilla was metaphor and allegory against atomic weaponry and nuclear testing, then what purpose does the legend of Al-Qaeda serve?