A Return to Earnestness

A few months ago our family sat down and watched a film about sheep who solve a murder mystery. The shepherd they love (a real, non-animated person, played by Hugh Jackman) is suddenly taken from this world by an act of violence. The sheep, having heard mysteries read to them by said shepherd for years, get to work solving the crime.

This sounds like a hilarious premise for a movie, and to be sure, The Sheep Detectives has its funny moments. I laughed a lot. But the film surprised me with its tenderness. The characters talk about the role of memory—how it pricks and hurts us sometimes; they discuss loss, death, and what happens to those left behind. They discuss the meaning of justice: “It means the good should not be harmed by the bad. The weak should not be harmed by the strong. And a friend should never be forgotten.”

The Sheep Detectives is just one entry in a long line of recent stories that seem to be returning to the rich place of earnestness in storytelling. I suspect that after a couple of decades of apologies for bad guys, confusing backstories, and cynical storytelling, our culture is longing for a bit of clarity. Bad guys can be bad. Good guys can be good. Death is often with us, and it hurts. Hope is hard sometimes.

This is feedback that we often hear about The Green Ember and its related stories. “New Stories With an Old Soul” is the goal. The “old soul” is one you’d find in Narnia, Aerwiar, and the Shire. It is sometimes cast aside as “old-fashioned,” but there again, we might understand that as a compliment. The old fashion we’re looking for is one where courage is summoned in the smallest of us. Evil is called evil; good is called good.

   

   

   

   

   

   

   

In her foreword to Malcolm Guite’s recent Galahad and the Grail, author Susanna Clarke sums up this virtue (also found in the Authuriad) in this way:

These men and women are all entirely lacking in cynicism and take it for granted that the most splendid thing they can do is try to live lives according to an impossible ideal, whether you call that ideal chivalry or an imitation of Christ.

I love that idea of living “splendidly”: according to the imitation of Christ. We know it is an impossible ideal, but we strive on.

I see this earnestness in storytelling in The Lord of the Rings and The Green Ember; I also saw it in the summer blockbuster Project Hail Mary and The Sheep Detectives. I see it in the popularity of certain musicians and books. People are longing to remember impossible ideals again.

In the news headlines, we see that slick savviness is winning over virtue. Here at Story Warren, we want to tell a different story. We want to help you do the same.

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Kelly Keller

Kelly Keller is the managing editor of Story Warren. She has her BS in Elementary Education from Messiah University and has taught various ages, but her favorite was worldview and literature with high school students. The “gap” in her resume is actually a window of eighteen years of homeschooling, which she recommends as an effective, though demanding, way of expanding one’s home library.

When she’s not behind her laptop, Kelly enjoys live music, baseball, reading great books, and traveling with her husband, David. Kelly hails from beautiful snowy New England, but after two decades in North Carolina, she feels right at home.

She invites you to subscribe to her newsletter, On the Common, or to follow her on Instagram.

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