Episode 1 : The beginning of the story

“In the end we all become stories” – Margaret Atwood

 

I think I was in the third or the fourth standard when we were told to write autobiographies of things, like, a pencil, a bag, a shoe, etc. For a strange reason I loved this exercise. I came up with the wildest possible stories for the life of my pencil, including, being rescued from a dog, rolling through puddles, accidentally traveling in buses to finally reaching me, a wonderful and caring owner. I remember even receiving the highest marks in the class, and the teacher praising me for the complexities in the story.

I felt like a God, who could write and rewrite the destiny of an insignificant, lifeless thing. It was a powerful, exhilarating feeling. That is when you realise that story telling is a very powerful art. Stories have the power to remain in the minds of the people long after the characters of the story have died. We still carry them in our hearts and minds, repeating them, learning from them, educating others or using it just as means to relieve tension.

In the olden days, merchants and traders and adventure seekers travelled shores and later on returning, spoke of the various stories in their journeys. These were tales of bravery, mystery, adventure, romance; and were mostly exaggerated for the desired effect on the listeners. These were told and retold till the whole village or town spoke the same story. Thus a legend is born. The future generations who know of it, speak of the legends with reverence, but, in the beginning it was just a simple story.

Now with globalisation, nobody needs to rely on one man’s tales for stories around the world. It is all available at the click of a button or at the turn of a newspaper. Everyone has a story to tell and everyone is a story teller.

I am reminded of Eleanor Roosevelt’s famous, judgemental quote:

“Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people.”

Ideas, no matter how great, remain ideas till they can be discussed as an event. But it is the stories about people that last longest, travelling through history to remain far imprinted long after the events have faded.

So move over Eleanor Roosevelt, this is the age of the story teller. While we can’t all be travelling bards, we can stay while the stories travel from us.

 

In the beginning was a word, the word became a story, the story became a life, and that life travels from person to person and never dies…