What is a story?

I often think about this, not in any global way, but in terms of the stories I read or hear or see. There are plenty of ways to define story - such as "a narrative, either true or fictitious" that details an event or series of events. Good so far as it goes - but...

But story is a whole lot more than that. We begin learning about story very young - remember listening to bedtime stories? We learn to read by reading stories. We learn about the world by reading stories. 

We learn about ourselves and our families by listening to atories told by family members at family events - though, as Hemingway says, "Memory, of course, is never true", so these stories (about the same event) can often vary wildly between siblings or other family members.

We learn about the past and possible futures by reading books about them. We learn about the present by reading newspaper or magazines, by listening to the news on the radio or watching it on television. Much of what we know, we know because of story.

And much of what entertains us comes from story as well. Not just in written form but we listen to story on the radio. We watch our "stories" on television. We read comic books and graphic novels and...

Story is everywhere. Story is who we are, what we do, what we know.

Story is life. Life is story.

Kate