The Power of Fiction

I find that reading a novel takes me a long time. This is because of connotation - evocative words and phrases that resonate deeply or descriptive writing that brings to mind my own experiences or memories. For example, a reference to a childhood game may set me to thinking about playing that game myself; a description of a lake in a misty early morning may evoke a memory of a fishing-camping trip.

I just read such a line in the book I am reading: in The Kite Runner the main character Amir says "the first time I saw the Pacific Ocean I almost cried." The Pacific to Amir was as vast and blue as he had seen it in movies watched as a child in dusty Afghanistan. I immediately began thinking: the first time I saw the Rocky Mountains I almost cried and likewise, the first time I saw the prairie I almost cried and the first time I stood on a glacier I almost cried.

I think it is a common emotional reaction for many people. We are stunned by the vastness - in awe at the size, distance, height, depth, breadth or flatness of the scene before us. We can never be truly prepared for the beauty by photos or movies or written descriptions. Or, perhaps, we are misled by other who look at the ocean and see only water or look at the mountains and see only rocks! Before I saw the prairies I was told I would see "miles and miles of nothing but nothing" and before I saw the mountains I was told that some people found mountains "forbidding" and that they gave them a sense of being closed in.