Church tradition holds that the first five books were all written by Moses, who was unique among the prophets in that God showed him visions of what came before him (instead of the future) to enable him to write Genesis. This does, however, mean that Moses described things from his own cultural frame of reference, so even things he saw were described in a certain way. For example, Sodom has been uncovered by archaeologists and confirmed to have been destroyed by a Tunguska-like meteor airburst - Moses, having no clue about space or asteroids and probably barely even knowing the earth is round, described this as "fire from heaven", divine force was the only way he knew.
If you think about it, the creation narrative lines up squarely with the stoned ape hypothesis. The sequence of events is as follows:
1) Humans arise in East Africa, where the climate is perfect and everything is edible. I call to mind the pasta describing Africa as the Garden of Eden.
God creates humans, male and female, and places them in a garden - this statement is actually written before Adam and Eve are personally named
2) These humans live lives which are nasty, brutish, and short a la chimpanzees where only alpha males get all the bitches
3) Man eats something that causes him to have visions and discover God. He realizes that he doesn't have to live this way. Probably shares some with his beta male friends.
Eve eats the fruit, and then Adam. They develop all kinds of knowledge they weren't ready for.
4) This new tribe of men, with their newfound knowledge, drag some women by force down the Nile valley across the Sahara knowing not what lay on the other side of it. Maybe took a couple generations to get there.
Expulsion from the garden - civilization comes at a price
5) Civilization founded on the one man one woman principle.
Adam and Eve potentially real people, but also archetypes of these first civilized men and their stupid wives who forced them to do this.