The Lost Art of Storytelling
An effective storyteller can alter culture.
Sadly, it seems the art of storytelling is going the way of a “paint by numbers” masterpiece. It’s become a formula and lost its truth, passion, and beauty.
A few years ago I went on a search for true storytellers. I dove into poetry, music and media—desperate for something original, something that made me a part of the story.
This post highlights some of what I’ve found.
Slam Poetry:
Oscar Brown Jr.
Music:
Derek Webb
Media:
Kings (To preface this, Kings is a loose adaptation of 1st and 2nd Kings found in Scripture—so it’s not an original story, but the telling of this story is beautiful)
Where have you seen the art of storytelling lived out?
-David
Good post. Like a scientific discovery, this post seemed to evoke more questions than answers for me. (Not a bad thing.)
I’d be curious to hear your thoughts on the following, perhaps in a future post:
- What are the specific criterion for a story to be considered “good”?
- If a story’s good elements are recognized and repeated, does that diminish the goodness of the original story? Are the subsequent stories less good?
- Is originality a necessary component for a story to be good?
- Assuming a good story has been found, what constitutes a good telling of the story versus a bad retelling of the story? Why?
John,
Rather then answer your questions one by one I want to go straight to the root.
For the sake of this post, the art of storytelling has the power to inspire rather then simply entertain. This is not a post against entertainment. It is simply a call to our storytellers to be bold and use their voice to inspire.
That may not have answered all (or any) of your questions but I hope it explains the purpose of my search for the art of storytelling being lived out.
-David
p.s. I think you live it out in your photography and films. Check John out here (http://johncarl.com/).