Everyone has a national narrative constructed from facts, false memories of events, and myths. People tell stories about their past to make some sense of the confusion of the present. They rewrite these stories from generation to generation, adapting them to the new reality. They omit, forget, or rephrase episodes that are disturbing or embarrassing. These stories have deep roots. They nourish our patriotism. They help us understand who we are, where we come from, where we belong. Our leaders believe them as much as we do. They connect us to the same "nation" and inspire us to sacrifice our lives in its name. The British have their "island history," which indicates continuous progress from the Magna Carta towards power, freedom, and democracy, with brilliant victories over the French in between: this is how Winston Churchill describes it in the grandiose History of the English-Speaking Peoples. The English created, exploited, and eventually lost three empires over time. The descendants of those subjects consider them the most greedy, violent, cunning, and hypocritical.

Of course, they themselves do not believe any of this about themselves. The "nation," however, is a slippery field. Nations resemble amoebas. They originate from the depths of History. They are constantly moving. They split by division, reunite in different formations, incorporate their neighbors or are absorbed by them, and then disappear. War, politics, marriages between dynasties, and referendums move regions from one side of the borders to the other. A person can be born in one country, grow up in a second, and die in another – all without ever leaving their birthplace.