My Notebook June 14 2009

Re: Communion and Communality We have heard it said - and repeated it ourselves ad nauseam - that literature involves a willing suspension of disbelief. I suppose this point of view extends to films. It means that, as rational beings, we cannot enter into the realm of artful language creations: plays, films, stories, novels, etc. - unless we check our common sense and rationality at the door. I never questioned it, but when you actually consider it, it appears to be rather ridiculous, dressed up in a feathery boa, and preening itself shamelessly. In other words, "willing suspension of disbelief" is a honky-tonk notion, not a serious one. I think it is much more likely that we are accepting the protocols of whatever realm of fantasy we are about to enter. We do not disbelieve; rather, we believe differently. It is just as if we were playing cowboys and indians: the protocol was, I shoot you first, you fall, you're dead...for a while. Then everyone is resurrected and we shoot more. We enter into the realm of enchantment not by an act of belief or disbelief, but by our openness to the story, by our willingness to participate, by hooking up our emotional response to the drama before us. It is accepted that everyone else is, too, so we are entering into one of those communions of communality. Those are the prerequisites for shared experience. They seem to be the protocols of codes: structures of acceptable behavior, that we must be "programmed" into exhibiting for us to enter into those experiences.