“A great story invites an expansion of understanding”

I’ve been reading more from Brain Pickings lately. One of the pieces I read is an essay by Maria Popova about storytelling and what makes a great story. The essay is titled “Wisdom in the Age of Information”. This is one of the quotes that stood out for me:

A great story, then, is not about providing information, though it can certainly inform — a great story invites an expansion of understanding, a self-transcendence. More than that, it plants the seed for it and makes it impossible to do anything but grow a new understanding — of the world, of our place in it, of ourselves, of some subtle or monumental aspect of existence.

I think this applies to both fiction writing and non-fiction. I can see how we can even tell great stories through business writing. Resorting to expanded PR pitches misses opportunities to make more meaningful connections, even though that is the easy option. This is especially when there is more emphasis, too much emphasis, on quantity than quality.

Popova’s essay is also the script for a great animated video which was produced for the Future of Storytelling Summit in 2014:

You can read the rest of Popova’s essay on Brain Pickings:

https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/09/09/wisdom-in-the-age-of-information/

Image credit: Pixabay