Storytellers and Storytelling

A detailed Summary of Storytellers and Storytelling

If a person was to examine fifty famous American short stories, ranging from Edgar Allan Poe to Maya Angelou, one important trait would immediately be noticed, namely, that all of them represent diversity, meaning that each story, due to the background and personalities of the storytellers, cover a vast range of material and styles. Yet all of these stories share many common characteristics, a few being that each creates a separate world outside of reality, challenges our often unexamined assumptions about life and living and utilizes literary/oral traditions that can be traced back to ancient times.

For the most part, the art of storytelling dates back to the dim past, yet the traditional Western techniques began in ancient Greece with such storytellers as Homer, Hesiod, Virgil and the great tragedians like Sophocles and Aeschylus. In ancient times, most people did not know how to write or read which made it necessary to relate stories via the oral tradition, a method where the storyteller would recite the tale and thus be handed down to future generations. But when writing became commonplace, the storyteller wrote down the tales which made it possible for wide dissemination throughout the known world.

The skills that are necessary to achieve these goals are not generally available to every storyteller, due to the absence of true insight, a great knowledge of the world and the ability to transpose reality into fiction. At the core of many stories lies the desire to explore great themes, whether based on fear, love or hate. The goal of any good storyteller should be to "produce realistic stories while maintaining a sense of illusion which will, in the long run, create a personal vision of life" (Baker 178).

Technically speaking, all stories must possess several important traits. These would be a clearly defined plot, composed of rising action, a climax and a denouement, a French term which describes a point in the story where the emotional feelings of the reader are released, a form of literary catharsis. Also, all stories must contain tension and conflict, the first being a form of suspense in which the reader does not clearly know what will happen next or conversely, realizes that something good or bad is about to occur, either with the plot or the characters; the second has everything to do with human interaction, being the relationship between one character and another, a trait which some recognize as the basis for true drama.

An additional necessity for all stories in the point of view of which there are several types-first person, second person and third person. With first person, the narrator/main character relates the tale; with s

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 982
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English