What the ***k Is Going On? Conspiracy Theorizing, Undernarration, and Narrative Literacy

Narrative is both a form of interpretation and of communication. Narrative structure allows us to map events and experiences, and we use that structure both to make sense of those events and experiences, and to communicate the sense we made of them. With this in mind, it is possible to conceptualise how each form of narration has a corresponding interpretative strategy: to name but a few examples, unreliable narration teases out a hermeneutics of distrust; puzzle narration one of puzzle solving; and metanarratives are met by meta-hermeneutics (but note how the relation between narrative strategies and interpretative strategies is not one of simple cause and effect: the possibility of ‘reading against the grain’ shows, for instance, how a hermeneutics of distrust may be employed for narratives meant to be fully reliable). <br/>I will analyse three mythopoetic works that heavily engage in undernarration (Prince 2023): the mock-historical and -religious Thet Oera Linda Bok (s.a., late 19th century), the Illuminatus! Trilogy by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson (1975), and 2023: A Trilogy (2017) by the Justified Ancients of Mu Mu. All works by ‘serious pranksters’, embedded in heavy authorial self-mythologisation, they constantly tease readers with hints of a story, while thematizing the hermeneutic stance this activates through intradiegetic, bizarre over-interpretation: etymology, detective work, and fan engagement with popular music respectively. My analysis will yield conspiracy theorizing as the hermeneutic counterpart of undernarration: if undernarration is teasing a story, but not telling it fully, then conspiracy theorising is assuming one is not being told ‘the whole story’ and must therefore start reconstructing it. As such, texts like these, and the awareness they create about the way in which engaging in narrative can lead to over-interpretation, can offer a training ground for narrative literacy.<br/>