Who's Telling the Story?

I recently came across a story regarding the human brain. The story began by describing the genius of Virginia Woolf’s writing—specifically her propensity to create complex, paradoxical characters in Mrs. Dalloway. According to the author, Woolf had the ability to create real characters who were at one moment full of joy, the next, drowning in despair—and she was able to do so in way that felt incredibly “accurate” to our everyday experiences. Woolf writes from the inside of the “diffused, despaired mind” begging the reader to ask “what is that that holds me together?” If it’s true, as scientists tell us, that there is no single cell that performs the role of the “center”—what is the “there there?” What holds a single human together? Full of contradiction, opposing sentiment—the search for the “glue” becomes the chief obstacle for neuroscientists.

The writer began with this introduction because he was interested in recent discoveries regarding the human brain. It seems that recently, scientists and doctors have made great strides in understanding the relationship of the “right brain” and “left brain” within the human person (a fascinating area to read and research). In order to understand the relationship, doctors severed the nerves or connecting points between each side of the brain in patients who suffered from epilepsy and mysterious seizures.

The discovery made by doctors was remarkable. They found, that if the right/left brain were severed, a person, over the course of time, could actually develop as two people within one. A man, for instance, would fight himself over reading a book. He would open the book with one hand, and shut it with the other . . . turn the light on with one hand, turn the light off with the other hand. Once the mysterious connection between the (now) polarizing regions had been severed, the patients became a person at odds within their own person.

Fundamentally, we are narrative creatures. This is why the writer began with the observation regarding the writing of Virginia Woolf. She knew, decades before these scientists, that humans are complex creatures. Art and science are just now coming together on this issue. I personally think one could go back even earlier to, let’s say, the character of Jacob in Genesis.

Most important in this discussion is the notion that humans are people who primarily learn within the context of a story. We remember in narrative fashion. We react in narrative fashion. We look towards the future in narrative fashion. When the patients mentioned in this study went about the rehabilitation process, they did so within the context of stories—trying to remember where they used to go, who they used to go with, why they used to behave in certain fashion. The only way a human can perform the previous is by remembering and retelling the stories of their lives.

At the conclusion of the piece, the writer asked an innocent but provocative question, “We are narrative creatures . . . that’s for sure . . . But the question remains: we cannot for certain determine the identity of the one who is telling the story.”