DCML Digest Issue 48

[Don Rosa]

> From: S?ren Krarup Olesen<raptus at stofanet.dk>
> Subject: Facts and fiction
> Lars wrote that Donald doesn't really have a birtday, and I tend to
> agree.
> So, when Don writes that Donald *has* a hat and an uncle, then yes, but
> that would be a "fictional hat" and a "fictional uncle". A real hat is
> something a human being can put on his head, and Donald has no such thing.
> It's like wondering how Harrison Ford today (2003) can be in his 50s,
> when he surely looks much younger in Starwars, which we all know happens
> in far future.

?????
If I wanted to get mired in this weird discussion, I'd point out that, by
the above logic that Donald can't have a hat or an uncle or a head because
he's fictional, it follows that he can't really even have the name "Donald"
since he doesn't exist. In fact, he can't even "have", period, since there's
nothing there to be "having" if he isn't there, eh?
Obviously a fictional character has a fictional hat and a fictional
birthday. So where does that get us?
Anyway, the real reason I respond is, despite the fact I don't think a great
deal of movies made in the past 35 years, I want to make sure there are not
people who misinterpret one of the greatest charms of one pretty fun movie
that was made in that time: STAR WARS is not about the "far future"... it's
about the distant past. "A *long time ago* in a galaxy far, far away". A
fictitious galaxy. I mean, if it's all fictitious it couldn't really happen
at all. And they didn't wear hats or have birthdays. And I have no idea
where this is going.