The Storyteller!

The story teller we watched in class the other day was, for lack of a more descriptive term, interesting. I found many things about her storytelling strange, but in between the strange aspects, were some very well thought out and performed actions.


The first story she told was that of a well known local story teller, who’s name I cannot remember for the life of me. I missed the title of the story, but it was something about “Tulips.” The storyteller’s first impression on me wasn’t very great. While she tried very hard to get down a voice for each character, I had trouble deciphering what she was saying through the thick accent she used for the voices. When she was saying “tulips” I thought she was saying “two loves.” Though her voice was confusing, her body movements were perfect. When she was an older character, she stood up tall and straight, and looked downwards to convey that she was talking to someone shorter than her, and what I thought to be true, someone less important than her in age. I really liked her facial expressions for the older woman in the story. She held her head out further than the rest of her body and really led herself with her nose. This reminded me of the exercises we worked on in class on letting certain body parts lead to represent character. It didn’t seem as important as I thought it was supposed to be, but watching the storyteller use her body differently for each character showed me that it does so much.


In her next story, I found myself at the verge of tears by the end. It was such a cute story, that I ended up saying “awe” at the conclusion. The storyteller had a specific voice for each of the many characters that were included (and there were a lot!). Her voice for the main character, the little boy, was perfect. It sounded so childish, so little boy like, that I completely forgot that there was a woman storytelling. I, once again, found her body movements the most striking part of the performance. She would look up at something when she was portraying the boy, and slouch just enough to make it noticeable. I didn’t need to hear her voice to know that she was someone little. When she was a man, she crossed her hands and positioned her legs in a manly way, and when she was a woman she sometimes but her hands gently on her hips and move with a slower, feminine walk. As she was holding the football, medal, and other items the boy gathers, she used her hands so well to convey them. She cupped her hand around the medal to show it was something smaller. She held the football with both hands, she held the shell to her ear, and shaped them to fit a shape of a shell. I could see the items, even though they weren’t there.


I personally didn’t like the telling of the “the tell-tale heart” by Edgar Allen Poe. I hadn’t read the story in a long while, but what I remembered from the story was not what I saw in the storyteller’s telling. It almost went to slow; her pauses were incorrectly placed and it made the story’s flow choppy. Like stated before, her hand movements were good, and for the same reasons as the other stories.


Overall, the storyteller was impressive. I’ve never seen / watched a storyteller before, so it was interesting. I liked the storyteller’s actions, but I was thrown off by her pauses, voice, and accents.