Curious about Storytelling? - Two Interesting Sites to Visit

Storytelling has always been with us, and its power is known by many. And, yet, when I mention to people that I am a professional storyteller, I realize from their reactions that we have a long way to go.

There is a lot of misinterpretation floating around. Many think that I read stories to young children. Others think I tell stories to children - wearing costumes and using props (like puppets). Few are aware that storytelling is known and used by many communities and organizations.

Storytelling is rampant in business, the digital world, diversity training, education, healing, medicine, and sharing of personal stories. There are storytelling festivals all over the world and articles being written about the use and power of storytelling.

You will find 150 recently published articles about storytelling at Storytelling - It’s News! Just visit http://www.storynet-advocacy.org/news/ . There is also a new feature on this website - quotes about storytelling from around the world. Just visit http://www.storynet-advocacy.org/news/quotes.shtml.

Now, if you want to have some fun creating your own fairytales, visit http://www.brown.edu/Courses/FR0133/Fairytale_Generator/gen.html to try the interactive Proppian Fairy Tale Generator, which includes whatever functions you choose, and also reveals the structures of various famous tales (if you click on the list to the right).

Quoting from the website, “Contending that fairy tales could be studied and compared by examining their most basic plot components, Formalist Vladimir Propp developed an analysis that reduced fairy tales to a series of actions performed by the dramatis personae in each story. Propp argued that all fairy tales were constructed of certain plot elements, which he called functions, and that these elements consistently occurred in a uniform sequence. Based on a study of one hundred folk tales, Propp devised a list of thirty-one generic functions, proposing that they encompassed all of the plot components from which fairy tales were constructed.”

Be careful, though, it will hook you. I guarantee that even though it will eat up some of your time, you will have fun and even end up more curious than ever about storytelling!