Stories show life as it might be, should be, shouldn’t be, never could be. Basic social values, skills, wisdoms and all show up here but so do all sorts of other things on many different levels.
It’s no accident that the founders of religions have been storytellers. Christ had his parables, Mohammed had his teaching of tales and the Buddha had his Jataka Tales.
It’s also entirely natural that the many of the first great books that form the cornerstones of literary cultures across the world have been books of stories brought together from oral tradition - The Panchatantra from India which became Kalila & Dimna in the Arab world, The Alif Layla wa Layla (Arabian Nights), The Decameron, The Fables of Aesop, Homer’s Odyssey and Iliad to name but a few.
English literature more or less begins with Chaucer’s Tales of Canterbury, essentially a book of stories told on the road. All of which is very interesting and intriguing.
