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Walt Disney, C.S. Lewis, Albert Einstein, and JRR Tolkien, what to they all have in common? Were they all of the same religion? No, C.S was a Christian turned atheist turned Christian, Walt and JRR where Catholic, and Albert was a Jew. Did they have similar personalities? No, Albert was mostly carefree and fun loving, JRR was somewhat of an introvert who wanted only him to work on his books, Walt was hard working and hated anything that didn't live up to his incredibly high standards and C.S was always described as being gruff and sure that he would never be remembered after he died. Then what did they have in common? They all have two things in common: they all went through hard times, and they all believed in fairy tales.
Lets start with Walt Disney. At age 22 Walt started a cartoon company that barely saw any success, causing him to eat dog food just to have money to pay the rent and that went bankrupt after only a few years, leaving Walt to move to L.A. with $40 dollars, a change of clothes, and some drawing tools. After trying to start an acting career he and his brother Roy started the Disney company and received a little bit of fame. However his best selling cartoon series: Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, and all but one of his artists were stolen by Disney's New York distributor: Universal Studios. After designing and making Mickey Mouse famous, Walt suffered anxiety attacks about the profits of cartoons. This caused him to be forced by his coworkers to take a vacation with his wife down the Mississippi River that got canceled and they had to go on a different vacation. After Snow White and the Seven Dwarves gave them enough money, Walt and Roy had a house built for their parents that ended up with Walt's mother dead from Carbon Monoxide poisoning. Right before World War Two Walt's artists went on strike because he refused to be a team player. When America declared war in 1941 Walt Disney Studios was taken over by the army and used for tank and artillery repairs; also most of his artists went to war. In 1942 Walt went to the premiere of Bambi, where during the scene where Bambi's mother was shot Bambi said "Mother, where are you Mother?" to which a teen girl in the audience shouted "Here I am Bambi," causing the audience to burst into laughter, except Walt. After the war the company was $4 million dollars in debts. And finally the day Disneyland opened people got in with forged tickets, the newly pored asphalt melted heeled shoes, and a plummer's strike meant that none of the water fountains worked.
Walt Disney could have quit at any time, heck he could have gotten work at the bank or something and had a pay check every month that he didn't have to divide among anyone. Walt could have quit everything and just drank himself to death. Walt Disney could have done a million things that probably all his family and friends would deem "sensible." But Walt didn't, because he believed in fairy tales. And look where that got him: almost everybody in the free world knows his name and the Disney company, and the company continues to make movies that are genuinely good for all ages and loves by generations.
Fairy tales are seen nowadays as this thing that creates a false hope about what life is, but Walt realized something that I hope we all realize: that Fairy Tales are the truest fiction we have ever had and may ever have. You see people forget that problems in the best of fairy tales aren't solved in a day, a lot actually have the protagonist go through years of hardships before they can live happily ever after.
As much as I don't want to make this longer then one post it looks like I'll have to. So next time I well go through the life of C. S. Lewis, and reveal some lies about happily ever after.
