Advait Dange 11a Storytelling is an art that consists of conveying messages, truths, information, knowledge, or wisdom to an audience in an entertaining manner. Music, art or props can be used to make the audience enjoy or understand more the message being conveyed (Dudley). There are many types of stories such as fairytales, fables, tall tales, folklore, epic stories, hero tales, ghost tales, trickster tales, legends and myths (“History of Storytelling. ”). Storytelling has been an essential aspect of human culture since its beginnings.
Storytelling can be considered the root of psychology, lecture-style teaching and religion. The roots of storytelling can be traced all the way back to the cave drawings done by primitive men. As they had not developed verbal communication yet, they used cave drawings as the means of communication to retell their everyday stories, such as a great hunt, to the people who had not participated and for later generations to remember all the glory of the stories those drawings portrayed. Over the centuries, storytelling has continued to develop.
When the first civilizations arose, storytelling began to be used in the form of oral communication and stories were passed down this way from generation to generation. Storytelling also began to be used in written form and the first short stories were written in Egypt over 4000 years ago. Professional storytellers also began to appear, who travelled from place to place telling stories usually in sung form. Storytelling was also developed in Ancient Greece in the form of live theatre.
Different stories developed in different parts of the world, also known as folklore, all shared one common theme, they were didactic stories used to teach what was right and what was wrong usually by showing the effects of each, which is why they were particularly used to educate children. During the Middle, storytelling continued to develop. As in Europe most people were illiterate, the Catholic Church used mystery plays to spread the stories of the Bible to the common people. In other parts of the world, such as the Middle East, Islamic leaders encouraged people to learn how to read and write to ensure veryone could read the Quran and avoid stories changing from place to place so that everybody was told the same stories. During the Renaissance, storytelling continued to develop. Writers such as Shakespeare took old tales and transformed them into new stories that could be enjoyed by both nobles and commoners (“The History of Storytelling. ”). In the 19th century, writers, such as the Grimm Brothers, began gathered verbal and written stories and turned them into great literary works which have become extremely popular reference works for stories even nowadays (“Fairy Tales. ). Nowadays, storytelling continues to be very relevant. Storytelling has completely changed and now it is most common in the form of books, movies, film, and online. Verbal storytelling has also developed into a new form, stand-up comedy. Not all stand-up comedians are storytellers but many of them could be considered comedic storytellers. Stories are told nowadays for many different reasons. They can be used to teach lessons, entertain, and encourage pride in your own country or culture, or to educate in history and traditions (“The History of Storytelling. ”).
Fairytales are a type of stories aimed especially at little children that have morals or meanings. Most of these stories also include the theme of magic, hence the word “fairy” (“What are fairytales? ”). Fairytales are a very important part of children’s theatre. This is because fairy tales are usually used or adapted in this form of theatre because they are the most appealing type of stories for young audiences. Children’s theatre is also a very good way of bringing fairytales to life and therefore makes the experience more entertaining for children than just being told the story or having to read it (Wood).
Fairytales have a great impact on a person’s development especially at a young age. They encourage people to dream and imagine. This helps people think out of the box and become more creative. Fairytales teach people positive lessons, morals, and values. For example, The Beauty and the Beast, shows that people should not judge things by the way they look. They are very helpful to teach children to difference between right and wrong in a entertaining manner but still conveying the message effectively. They are also easily remembered by the children and remind them of the underlying lesson they have learnt from it.
Fairytales open children’s minds and encourages them to read to know more stories. They also encourage other hobbies and talents such as drawing or acting to express the story in a different artistic form (Uno). There are many life skills that fairytales can help you develop such as the ability to handle problems as the characters in them help children connect them with their own lives and their problems and consider what they would do if they were in the character’s shoes, and therefore also teaching them to empathize with unfamiliar people, places and situations.
They also help children build emotional resiliency as they teach them that bad things can happen to anybody. Another positive effect of fairy tales on children is that it helps them develop their language and communication skills as by having somebody telling them the stories they learn new vocabulary and by discussing the story they learn how to communicate their ideas effectively. Fairytales teach people about their own culture and allows them to explore their roots as each places has their own fairytales. Also, fairytales teach people about different cultures.
This is because there are fairytales from all around the world and they usually reflect the culture from where they are from, and therefore show different aspects of that culture such as traditions and lifestyle The huge impact that fairytales have on us during our childhood definitely affects who we became later in life. Fairytales make us dream of accomplishing great things, just like the characters in them. This makes us become ambitious and work hard do achieve our dreams. They teach us the values and morals that we will follow for the rest of our lives such as what is right and what is wrong.
This also causes fairytales to have an impact on our decisions and define who we are. Fairytales also make us look at the bright side of things and believe in happy endings (Lewis). Fairytales are developed and changed. An example of a fairytale that has been changed is the Disney version of The Little Mermaid inspired by Hans Christian Andersen’s original The Little Mermaid. In the Disney version, Ariel, the main character loses her voice, while in the original story she gets her tongue cut out by the antagonist, Ursula.
This is because the original story was written for adults and therefore in order to adapt it for younger audiences, Disney had to sanitize the story. Sanitizing means the story is adapted to be more appropriate, especially for younger audiences, by eliminating all the violent details. When a story is sanitized, the villains are also made less evil. This alters the mood of stories but the original message of the story remains the same. It also makes the story less scary and more entertaining for the younger audiences (“What fairy tales have changed over time? ”). There are four main elements of storytelling.
The first one is that storytelling needs to be interactive. This means that there must be two-way communication between the teller and the listener. The responses of the listener can affect how the story is being told. Another element of storytelling is that it uses actions. This includes vocalization, physical movement and/or gestures. This element only applies to verbal storytelling. Storytelling has to present a story, or narrative. There are many different art forms that present stories but storytelling includes other components that are only present in storytelling.
The last main element of storytelling is that it needs to encourage the imagination of the listeners. In storytelling, it is the listeners who need to imagine the characters, actions and events of the story in their mind. This is what makes a story personalized to each individual (“What Is Storytelling? ”). Fairytales also have many elements. Fairytales are usually set in the past and this is usually shown by the words “Once upon a time”. Fairytales need to use the element of magic such as magical people, animals or objects. Magic can be used in positive or negative ways. Also, fairytales usually include the theme of royalty.
Fairytales also need to include good and evil characters. Another element of fairytales is that they need to have a conflict which is later resolved, leading to a happy ending. Also, a fairytale needs to teach a lesson, or demonstrate an important cultural value (“Common Elements of Fairy Tales. ”) When writing a story that engages and challenges a younger audience without patronizing there are many different things you need to consider. In order to engage them, the story should include themes that are relevant to people their age such as friendship and courage. The underlying message of the story should also be useful to them.
To challenge a younger audience, you need to include a message which is not too obvious and that they will need to think about and analyze the story in order to understand it. You should also try to avoid anything that will be a bad influence to the children such as violence or other negative elements that are not appropriate to people their age. Overall, storytelling is a key part of cultures all around the world and has been the root of many other things such as literature. Storytelling has developed throughout the centuries and will continue to do this in the future in order to be relevant to future audiences.
This could be done in many different ways such as with the use of all the technological advances. There is something that is sure, and that is that storytelling will never die out (The History of Storytelling. ”). Works Cited Common Elements of Fairy Tales. N. p. : n. p. , n. d. PDF. Dudley, Berice. “What Is Storytelling. ” Australian Storytelling. N. p. , n. d. Web. 04 Mar. 2013. <http://www. australianstorytelling. org. au/txt/d-what2. php>. “Fairy Tales. ” Fairy Tales. N. p. , n. d. Web. 04 Mar. 2013. <http://hercules. gcsu. edu/~mmagouli/fairy_tales. htm>. “History Of Storytelling . Storytelling Day. N. p. , n. d. Web. 04 Mar. 2013. <http://www. storytellingday. net/history-of-storytelling-how-did-storytelling. html>. “The History Of Storytelling. ” Essortment. N. p. , n. d. Web. 04 Mar. 2013. <http://www. essortment. com/history-storytelling-21197. html>. Lewis, Rocky. “The Importance of Fairy Tales. ” Spring Garden Waldorf School Blog RSS. N. p. , n. d. Web. 04 Mar. 2013. <http://blog. sgws. org/the-importance-of-fairy-tales/>. Uno, Rave. “Influence of Fairy Tales on Children. ” Buzzle. com. Buzzle. com, 16 July 2011. Web. 04 Mar. 2013. <http://www. uzzle. com/articles/influence-of-fairy-tales-on-children. html>. “What Are Fairy Tales? ” WikiAnswers. Answers, n. d. Web. 04 Mar. 2013. <http://wiki. answers. com/Q/What_are_fairy_tales>. “What Fairy Tales Have Changed over Time? ” Yahoo! Answers. Yahoo! , n. d. Web. 04 Mar. 2013. <http://answers. yahoo. com/question/index? qid=20090511183240AA0TEM7>. “What Is Storytelling? ” National Storytelling Network. N. p. , n. d. Web. 04 Mar. 2013. <http://www. storynet. org/resources/whatisstorytelling. html>. Wood, Danielle. “Why Children’s Theater Matters. ” Education. com.
