Reframing myths – stories of the city

Shrouded in the mists of memory, tinted in certain sepia tones of distance, told and re-told stories of glory days come, gone and here again. Certain people and places carry a baggage of mythology. In people it’s almost inevitable – a construction of enigmatic behaviour, a flair for exaggeration, battle tails recounted at dinner parties; everyone propagates their own myth, some are accepted and encouraged by others, some are rejected. We do it endlessly with celebrities, politicians, sports personalities, even journalists: Bill Clinton, the relaxed sax player with Southern charm and Northern politics; Tiger Woods, the steely-eyed genius of the golf course; Jeremy Paxman, hard-hitting, strikingly intelligent, witty.

It’s never entirely without truth, of course. But on some level it must be a careful construction. In some ways our everyday identities will always be constructed, playing roles as student, mother, taxi driver, whatever. More subtly, but perhaps more persuasively, we construct our identities as black, white, Asian, gay, straight, man, woman and all the subgenres of identification that one can find beyond those. As you continue to break down the classifications you come closer to that unique, undividable me. Each of these sub-divisors has their own set of mythologies, identifiers and implications. And on some, perhaps less public, level we propagate a myth all of our own – reliable, intelligent, charming, sociable. None of these are false, but it is never the whole story.

Inanimate objects are just as capable of developing mythologies (the hallowed turf, the sacred shroud, the lucky hat). Such objects can become the focus of worship, they possess a power far beyond their use as things and inevitably they have a history to them which people enjoy, which people find something of themselves in. Such mythologies really do relate to a sense of where we have come from – a father introducing a son to the pocket watch that has been passed through the generations, an atavistic link to a world he cannot inhabit. Such objects become powerful and permanent tokens of origin; they provide scope and definition to where we have come from; they initiate a legacy which one is party to, and to which one has to adhere. One may even go as far as to speculate that such objects (of a familial, cultural or religious nature) go a long way to ensuring social stability and cultural cohesion.

Some of the greatest mythologies surround cities. Hong Kong: bustling Eastern (this is, of course a mythology from Europe) metropolis of sky-scrapers and Old Colonial charm. Tokyo: city of endless money-making, epic movements of people, a spiritual centre. New York: exciting, pulsating place where art and culture are pressure boiled and where anything can happen. Dublin: quaint and pleasant city of slightly bleary eyed jolly Guinness drinkers, statues, history and music. London: city of ancient rituals and traditions with a thrilling mix of artistic and cultural activities, a people of steeled cohesion.

In this last named case, the myth is sadly lacking in reality. London, as a place to live in and as an experience for anyone who ventures forth on its famous thoroughfares, is a nightmare. Streets heaving with suicidal-looking pedestrians, crazed black cab drivers for whom zebra crossings are little more than an opportunity for some excitement, unfriendly and inept staff at overpriced and odd smelling eateries, corporate branding that has ensured every café, pub, restaurant and shop is a carbon copy of every other on every other dirty street. Screeching underground trains, filled with more dead-faced souls, trundle through century old tunnels, shifting millions of people from one place to the next every day. It is a city which exists to ensure the false economy of its over-inflated nature (not to mention its grossly over indulgent levels of consumption and waste) is propagated and supported in a continuous cycle.

The two greatest constituents of the London myth are that it is a place of solidarity and cultural engagement.

Many will have, as I did, witnessed the unforgettable scenes on July 7^th 2005. London, having been struck by a series of terrorist bombs, continued. People got to work as best they could. Then, with the transport systems grounded, they walked home. Walking from central London to the suburbs is quite a trek; but there they were, endless streams of regular Londoners walking quietly home, because that’s what they had to do. There was solidarity in that mass of people, there was a strength that you only find in a people that support each other. We were reminded of our (cultural, historical) memories of Blitz era London, bomb shelters and blackouts, the all clear and The White Cliffs of Dover. The pit of one’s stomach was tweaked by the scenes. “Yes”, one though, “this truly is one of the greatest cities of the world.” A city held together in solidarity – a rare and wonderful thing indeed.

The vision of a cultural London is more historically based. King’s Road, The Beatles, Hendrix, The Rolling Stones, David Hockney – The Swinging Sixties. A time of political and cultural revolution; hippies in Hampstead and Belsize Park; the golden age of The Royal Court Theatre; a new era of peace and harmony. The King’s Road is now one of the most fashionable shopping streets (no independent stores could even consider the rents in such a place); Abbey Road (or somewhere in the general area) has a Beatles museum; Belisize Park and Hampstead’s hippies have either moved on, or grown up, shaved and started working in media or finance. The cultural institutions of London today, many and valuable though they are, seem more concerned about the ever dwindling funding from the Arts Council and performance related targets, the very essence of life under New Labour. There is all but no space for experimental or fringe arts – the cost of even a small theatre space in London means that only the most crowd pleasing pile of drivel will break-even.

I am, I know, being unfair – July 7^th was an incredibly rare set of circumstances, which produced something truly unique, unpredictable and perhaps in line with human nature. That Londoners don’t display the same signs of communal solidarity on a daily basis is an inevitability of urban living, or so it would seem from here. The past always produces misty eyed memories, especially when those who lived through it are still around, though not living quite as exciting lives as they like to believe they once did.

But either way these things have found their way into the mythology of London as a place. They are inscribed on the fabric of the city, they are written into its historical narrative, they are as much part of London as Big Ben and the changing of the guard. But that’s just it – London, as we like to understand it, as we like to speak about it, is a set of signifiers with cultural or historical significance; it is a fantasy constructed through the telling and re-telling of those places, those times and (perhaps) an exaggeration of the significance of those self-same things.

But does it matter? Arguably the myth of London, like the myth of how your grand dad won the war, is harmless and unimportant. It’s just part of the way we identify our place in the world, a way to attach ourselves to something we can understand, be proud of even. It gives us context and a basis for definition and identity. These things are valuable – essential even.

But there are moments, in the most genuine of London experiences, when the myth and reality start to bare next to no relation. London can possess qualities of incredible intimacy (unspoiled days spent picnicking on Primrose Hill spring to mind) and immense fun. But even these do not tally with the agreed, collective mythology of the place. Perhaps the only way to survive is to create your own myth of the city – rediscovering memories down shady roads, catching a scent on the breeze, buzzing through streets of good times gone, and maybe to come again.

And here we come close to the nub of the point – the myth’s I outlined above will be disputed by many. We do all construct our own myths, found in the retelling of stories and the recounting of experiences related to place. The problem comes when myths are imposed from elsewhere. See above – you’ll find assertions about places, arbitrary associations between potentially random cultural signifiers. It is something you find in newspapers, documentaries, novels and the ever expanding broadcast news. These are the building blocks of society, and those who control the narratives of myth have a hand in the control of society.

Perhaps our only recourse is to insist on reframing the myths to our own purposes. Shifting the viewfinder to a new position, taking one section and making it our own.

These mythologies are only ever a product of our desire. Without people to pass them on, agree on them, adhere to the collective experience, they would vanish in an instant. Is it the ever more prevalent mass media that pushes such myths through into our subconscious with greater speed and effect? Or is it simply that we need the myths to get through more easily – the realities feeling just a little too boring, or empty, or uninspiring? Either way we sustain the mythology because it sustains us; we need to believe in it – what else is there?

- by Neil Keating

This entry was posted by Neil Keating, on Sunday, 20 April 2008. You can leave your response.