THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS: A Story That Never Ends

Sit down, I’ll tell you a story.
A fairytale-not-a-fairytale.
It will be completely true, like every fairytale.
And like every fairytale, completely made up.

Once upon a time there was a certain sage, gifted with the power of words. It was enough for him to look you in the eyes, and he could already begin weaving his tale. He told of lands you always wanted to visit, he told it in such a way that they seemed within arm’s reach. He showed you the person you always wanted to be, and allowed you to feel that you truly were just such a person. Thanks to his stories, the world endured and endured, and kept pushing forward. That’s how it should be, right?

One day a wanderer visited the sage’s hermitage. He didn’t need stories, because he had lived them all and personally contributed to the creation of many of them. Some say he was the prince of darkness himself — because it is with him, after all, that one makes pacts with one’s soul at stake. If you ask me, I’m not convinced at all. But I know that he was a gambler: he loved a good game. He liked wagers and appreciated jests, he could be a bit mischievous, but there was one thing he could not allow: the interruption of the story. Because if the story were interrupted, he himself would cease to exist.

There was once a certain beautiful girl who liked to think of herself as imprisoned in a tower. She loved to read fairytales about a nonexistent world where everything is smooth, orderly, and fits together perfectly. She dreamed that someday — if not today, then tomorrow — she would escape and find the world of her imagination. She was a princess, only very poor: she wore gypsy dresses and was sometimes hungry. But she had her father, an aged king, and a loyal squire who loved her more than anything. Until one day a knight on a white horse arrived. Although it was not he who saved her, but she who saved him — that didn’t matter.

The knight was charming, able to read every one of her wishes, and he had left behind a world in which he had been powerful and wealthy: like every wanderer seeking to win a princess. When he played wondrous melodies on his magic flute, even chickens stopped clucking and froze in awe. Only he was capable of breaking the curse that weighed upon the princess’s life. But he was not a true knight at all — only the big bad wolf.

Once upon a time there was a young boy who wanted to do good. Maybe not always, but chance caused him to desire it. And if you want to know, for a long time he did quite well. He might even have become someone great, if not for a certain malicious magic mirror. The boy didn’t remember where it came from — it had been there forever. He hated looking into it, but he couldn’t help himself. And the mirror showed him a different face each time. Sometimes that face pleased him: it was sincere, full of hope. On such days the boy dreamed of reaching the heavens and accomplishing great and remarkable deeds.

On such days he felt quite well. He tolerated worse the days when the mirror presented him with the seductive dandy who lied effortlessly and darted his eyes around. But the dandy was, in truth, harmless, bearable. The worst days came when from the mirror looked a grim, threatening, evil face. The face of a man capable of anything, a cheat and a tyrant. Then the boy became afraid. He squeezed his eyelids shut as hard as he could and repeated to himself that none of these faces were his own, and that if he could one day manage to escape and start anew — he would succeed in discovering what his true face looked like. But if he were to succeed, there would be no moral.

And once there was another boy — not quite so young anymore, but always so cheerful that everyone said with envy “well, he never seems to age!” (the more malicious added “he refuses to grow up at all!”). That boy had one dream: he wanted to possess the secret of the story that lasts forever. And you must know that he had experienced quite a lot already: he sought (and acquired) the Grail, travelled in time, crossed every possible altered state of consciousness, and even personally met the Brothers Grimm. Yet he constantly searched for the source of the true mystery. Seeking it, he strayed even into the unfriendly regions of the land of herbs.

Until one day he — completely by accident — came upon the performance of a travelling show. And although hardly anyone else stopped to watch, he stood still as if enchanted. Thus the boy met the sage, who must have lived thousands of years to understand why he actually lives. And his good friend, of whom some say that he is the prince of darkness, though I personally am not convinced of that.

It was from them that he learned that there is no beauty without darkness, no love without risk, no miracles without mistakes, no knights who would not, at least once in their lives, become big bad wolves, and no guarantee that the ending will always be happy.

And so the boy — not quite so young — discovered the secret of the story that lasts forever. He promised to share it with anyone willing to listen.

And so he did.