[lbo-talk] Carville picks up the "narrative" idea

Jon Johanning jjohanning at igc.org
Tue Nov 9 20:30:38 PST 2004


On Nov 9, 2004, at 2:54 PM, Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:


> I think, btw, that there is something about the American collective
> psyche
> that feels an undying attraction to this kind of "wild west" stuff -
> which
> foreign observers, like myself, view with a mixture of bemusement and
> disbelief. I mean, most folks who populate this country have their
> ancestry
> roots in the factories of New York, Baltimore and Chicago and coal
> mines of
> Pennsylvania. Only a small handful of them were cowboys. So if they
> are
> yearning for their roots, they should identify with workers and union
> organizers, not cowboys. This whole pioneer/wild west thing is 100%
> made in
> Hollywood. I find it hard to understand why it has such a strong
> attraction.

Hey, what have European peasants traditionally dreamed of? Marrying the Prince, a la Cinderella?

Probably not exactly -- that's just a wild guess. But common people, peasants or laborers, everywhere dream of some fantasy-land where they are free from the burdens of their existence. The "Wild West" is that land, for a lot of Americans. So much so that I never quite understood why TV and film Westerns became unpopular.

In any case, I think it's revealing that, if the Cinderella story is indeed typical of European dreams, it culminates in the heroine unifying herself with the government, whereas the American Wild West myth involves individuals (with their families) leaving the effect East Coast and striking out to the "empty" (native Americans being killed off or confined to reservations) territory, where there is little or no law except what the local sheriff can provide and the tough, enterprising individual can make himself into whatever he wants (I'm using the masculine pronoun deliberately here), including a millionaire.

Jon Johanning // jjohanning at igc.org __________________________________ A sympathetic Scot summed it all up very neatly in the remark, 'You should make a point of trying every experience once, excepting incest and folk-dancing.' -- Sir Arnold Bax



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