The Rambling Family Tree of Stories

Image by Petr Kratochvil

Ramification is what I love about stories. Stories squirrel into the subconscious and dig out hidden curiosities that grow new branches some thick, some thin. Jean Houston’s A Mythic Life was recommended for my 2013 reading project. Her memoir birthed two story children - Joseph Campbell’s A Hero with a Thousand Faces and Jane Howard's Margaret Mead biography.

 

I knew about Campbell’s book, but was never compelled to read it until Houston expounded on his archetype studies. As for Mead, she was a name on a list of 74 American women that I had for my project. Her Wikipedia bio was dull enough that I continued to the next name on my list. If the wiki-entry had been written by Houston however, Mead would have topped the list. Houston illustrates Mead as a bossy, energetic, game-changing woman. I’m a descendent of independent, sometimes hardheaded, women. Mead through Houston’s eyes is my perfect page-bound role model.

The branch that led to Houston’s memoir was oddly enough AlysonNoel's Immortal Series. Her series made me thirst to learn about human potential and the metaphysical. Without the series, A Mythic Life’s write-up highlighting Houston’s exploration of human potential may have seemed too ethereal for my project.

Further down the tree, the branch leading to Noel’s Immortal Series is Twilight. A friend cajoled me into reading Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight years ago. Ante-Twilight, I had been on a non-fiction diet for years. Twilight was the bacon that lured me off the non-fiction wagon and into a field blooming with young adult books.

Some branches have obvious themes. Books about World War II bloomed into books about resistance movements, then into espionage, Presidential histories, and ending with Madeleine Albright’s autobiography. Other branches, like the Meyers to Noel to Houston to Mead branch, include the eccentric eternally-youthful cousin next to the erudite mal-tempered professor.

The story family-tree rambles, twists, and buds. It’s a vibrant constantly growing organism of curiosity. I’ve nurture it daily since I was six. The original seed for all of my reading limbs was Fun with Dick andJane by William S. Gray and Zerna Sharp. What was yours?