Customer Reviews

Making Stories: Law, Literature, Life

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As a student interested in narratology, I found Jerome Bruner's book an excellent manual on how narratives effect our everyday lives. With the minimal a minimal amount of jargon, Bruner was able to convey what narrative was; how narrative is used; and how we interpret narrative in the stories we tell and the stories we read. This book is a must have for anyone interested in narratology or for any person seeking for a concise and clear understanding of how narratives work in our lives.

This is a gem that has quickly become one of my favorite Jerome Bruner books, a brief yet succulently satisfying account of how we use stories to make sense of our lives. As a narrative therapist, I find it affirming of many of the understandings of human social processes that have become invaluable in my work, particularly the notion that through narrative we sort of make ourselves up as we go along. As Bruner observes, "we constantly construct and reconstruct our selves to meet the needs of the situations we encounter," doing so "with the guidance of our memories of the past and our hopes...for the future." To me, our ability to make stories about ourselves (creating a "selfhood" along the way) is both invigorating and inspiring, as is this elegant little book that studies, honors and celebrates such a capacity. Well done Mr. Bruner!

Writing is pedantic and the author seems to have to stretch to make the connection between narrative, law, and everyday life. I have a fairly large vocabulary, but the author sent me to the dictionary several times... The passages on narratives as a function of self-making and culture do not break any new ground, and there are probably other books that can more fully explore the importance of story-telling. Perhaps a good selection for lawyers or others who do not have a strong understanding of the functions of narrative.