Enchanted Hunters

Enchanted Hunters

   Today’s blog will be focused on the prime focus of any storyteller. In other words, what we are hoping to achieve in the story telling process. But in order for that to happen we must first consider how to get there.

   First Rules to tell by:

   Rule Number 1  

        Always keep in mind that everyone is different and that works both ways.

        (  There are probably as many storytellers with different styles as there are audience members. No matter how good you are I can almost always bet you there will be someone in your audience who will tell you how you could had told the story better or who just didn’t like your story or  your version of the story or maybe even you. Accept it and move on it is a fact of life.)

Rule Number 2   

         Tell stories that you like. The audience can tell when you’re telling a story that you are not comfortable with. It shows. Believe me I know.

Rule Number 3 

           No matter how badly you screw up a story never pause and apologize or stop to straighten it out. Reorganize the story in your head as you are telling and push on no matter what even if you screwed it up. Been there done that a couple dozen times.

Rule Number 4     

      Have Fun. This is an absolute must. You are not just a storyteller but an entertainer. If you are having fun so will your audience.

Rule number 5          

      Throw yourself under the bus. Give it all up. Don’t hold back. Commit yourself completely to your story.

      ( this means use your voice (in whatever means is necessary to convey the story), your body hands, arms, fingers , face, eyes. You become the story.)

  What happens if you do all of the above? Good Question. A lot can. And that leads us to what we are hoping to achieve as tellers.

     What we want to achieve with our audience while storytelling is to suspend dis-belief. As a Storyteller you want them to forget that you are the storyteller. Your desire is to get them to commit themselves fully to your story. You want them to be consumed by whatever ministrations you use to draw them into the story. You want them to throw their bodies under the bus with you.

  This is pretty much my code of performing these days. My desire is simple. I want to lead them down that path, to walk down the road with Jack, to face the Elf King, to challenge the black knight, to face off with the monster. I want them to smell the roses and the carnage without ever having to really go into it. By “go in to it” I mean without having to describe in tedious detail the developments of the story. We humans have a wonderful in fact extraordinary capability for being devoured and manipulated through words.  Words create pictures in our minds.

  An oral storyteller and a author are two very different creatures. Keep in mind that we are not authors and we do not need to give them every detail. We use suggestions and use emphasis to help our audience visualize the world that we want them to enter. We are in search of Enchanted Hunters and they are out there waiting for their stories.  

      Enchantment is a magical word. That word alone, suggest endless possibilities. And that is exactly what I am talking about when I speak of “Words create pictures in our minds”. There is an almost unavoidable problem with beginning storytellers to try to tell stories as if they were a reading from a book ( I know that I did). That is because tellers are often heavy readers and don’t understand the transformation from literary storytelling to the verbal or Oral storytelling. In Maria Tatar’s book Enchanter Hunters this specific concept / element (magically descriptive words) is heavily discussed. In fact I would recommend reading her book if you can find it. It is quite an eye opener. In her book she reveals that the style of literary storytelling used in preserving the Grimm tales and other such folk lore is closer akin to what a verbal or Oral teller should be trying to achieve; A simple yet eloquent retelling of a story, where certain descriptive words help the reader to achieve a visual rendering of events.

     The literary language in this kind of story relies on choice words to illumine the readers mind with mental pictures. The reader does it without thinking about what is happening or why. This is specifically what an oral storyteller should be shooting for, the very essence of oral storytelling. You take this and combine it with your own visual manipulations, ( face, body etc. actions) and you’ve built a bridge for you audience to cross over into your world.
   When I talk of using your body I am not saying you need to be jumping around like a monkey. The Storyteller should use distinct subtle actions that help to enforce the development of your story. Facial expressions are critical, hand and arm movement adds reinforcement. In other words your physical actions should complement the story.

   I make it all sound so simple but it took me a good 7 years to get to where I really grasped all of these concepts. I was doing it without understanding what I was doing because of how I had come through the door to storytelling. Also in my case it was due to my approach and style to storytelling that I adopted early on. But again I really had no idea why it was working. In other words I made lots of mistakes early on since I did not understand the principles that were carrying me forth.

   To be a good storyteller consider yourself to be a vessel through which your audience will be able to travel to your final destination. Your Story.

Gary Whitaker

 11/07/2011