Throughout human history, people have relied on mythologies, on ancient stories handed down in their cultures which exemplify the working out in the human psyche of the correct and useful responses to the challenges of a typical journey in life. In our “enlightened” new world, however, we dismiss these stories as childish fables, but the underlying messages — how to achieve independence from our parents, how to become mature, autonomous individuals, or how to reconcile ourselves to dying — we leave in the bookcase with our old copies of Peter Rabbit. This is indeed a brave new world. Would that it were also informed, so as not to be so hopelessly sad.
Nick Hilton - Reflections 