Pater Familias

Theories, observations, and articles, by Philip Schaefer · All posts · Categories

ALL LIFE STORIES ARE INTERESTING.

May 23, 2007 at 5:08 PM · Literature

ALL LIFE STORIES ARE INTERESTING. Dan McAdams, who has in the course of his research read hundreds of stories that people have told about their lives, says that, “In all the years I’ve been doing this, I’ve heard maybe one boring life story.” People lead colorful, exciting lives, lives that could not be put into fiction because they would seem implausible.

2 comments

Mary Jane May 29th, 2007 at 9:43 pm

This reminds me of Auden’s remark about how any marriage is more interesting than any love affair, probably because marriage is the stuff of life while a love affair is an incident. Sorry, “Bridges of Madison County” fans.

Pater Familias » BESTE--AN EXCITING LIFE. June 2nd, 2007 at 10:36 am

[…] EXCITING LIFE. I posted previously about how the people we meet generally have lived more exciting lives than the characters we read […]