Mankind demands legends because responsibility outruns conscious, willed acts

Evidence

Legends have always played a powerful role in the making of history. Man, who has not been granted the gift of undoing, who is always an un-consulted heir of other men’s deeds, and who is always burdened with a responsibility that appears to be the consequence of an unending chain of events rather than conscious acts, demands an explanation and interpretation of the past in which the mysterious key to his future destiny seems to be concealed. Legends were the spiritual foundations of every ancient city, empire, people, promising safe guidance through the limitless spaces of the future. Without ever relating facts reliably, yet always expressing their true significance, they offered a truth beyond realities, a remembrance beyond memories. — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 536

Categorization

• DEFINE: Arendt defines the legend as an interpretive device that resolves the mismatch between inherited responsibility and conscious action — a concept to carry into readings on nation and imagined community.
• XREF: connects to: Myth is what consciousness must overcome to become human.