Kev Kennedy's Blog

I'd like to 'retcon' my life

Back in the early 1980s several Star Wars novels and comics were published, which 'filled in the gaps' as it were. Then in the 1990s even more novels and comics were published which filed the gaps in differently. Then came the movie prequels - the latest one, called The Clone Wars, is a feature length cartoon showing in cinemas now - and the gaps were filled in again, and again were filled in diffferently.

In the world of science fiction geekery, this is known as "Retroactive Continuity" - 'retconning' for short. It's the deliberate alteration of previously-stated 'facts' in a fictional history to enable a new story to take place. It's what's happening with the Batman movie franchise at the moment. We know how the story has developed - let's go back and make sure that the history matches the tale we're telling.

It would be nice to do that in real life too. Can you imagine retrospectively altering your life as a teenager? Instead of that one disastrous date, your youthful fling could become one of the world's most tragic romances. The trouble you got into for not doing your homework can be transformed into a heroic stand against authoritarian injustice. The desperate, isolated sense of loneliness could be told as a tale of deliberate withdrawing in order to discover the secrets of life.

Maybe some people do retcon their lives. I hear people talking about events I was a part of and their interpretation of it all seem wildly at odds with how I remember it. My mum's quite adept at retelling stories about me that aren't quite factually true.

But the bottom line is we aren't comic book superheroes. What's happened in our lives so far did actually happen and saying it didn't doesn't make it any the less true. And the more we try to recast our personal history, the less authentic we appear as people.

Retconning your past is about trying to make your story look artifically amazing. But, if you, and I, are going to have genuine futures we have to stop worrying about what our past lives look like. What matters most is what our futures will look like.

Created on Tue 19th August 2008 12:59