Two weeks ago, I’ve noticed that I can't join the conversation of my grandson and his father, my son-in-law: day by day, before and after the pre-school, daylong on weekends: many strange names, some of them vaguely familiar, and very often the grandson’s question "is he a good guy" or "is he a bad guy" Then I recognized the Star Wars terminology, primarily from the names of battleships and starfighters. I even browsed through the two Star Wars comic books of my grandson - but I did not join the conversation.

My grandson, age 5, is a smart and very inquisitive boy. For the last two summers we spent together, I’ve tried my best to answer his numerous questions "why" and "what", "why" in particular. However, the Star Wars story stuck me, at first, as an inappropriate upbringing environment for his age. He is so deeply immersed in the story, his Star Wars comic books are his main literature, his current toys include Imperial Star Destroyer, Tie Interceptor, B-wing Starfighter, and some other Star Wars vehicles I don’t recognize. His "why" questions go way beyond the story as presented in his comic books: why the good guy turns into a bad gay or opposite, why some guys have more power than others, why someone wants to conquer other worlds, and so on. And he is persistent, any answer is likely to rise more "why"s.

The more I was thinking of it, however, the close I was to the conclusion that the Star Wars story is more appropriate for my grandson then the children stories my generation was exposed to. Our stories were very simple, only a couple of characters, good guys stayed always good, bad guys always bad, animals and objects involved were rather limited personifications of humans, practically no technics used. And the good guys always won. Not so in the Star Wars story: a multitude of characters, animals and robots on the level with humans, no one is spared of losing at some stage in spite of superb technics. So, the Star Wars story, although a sci-fiction story, is close to the contemporary social reality then the children stories of my generation. And may have high upbringing value.