Customer Reviews

The Way of the Storyteller

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4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
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The handful of other reviews here are not very substantial. I'm not an oral storyteller; I'm a writer looking for help with pitching stories. So my perspective on this book differs from other reviewers.

First, the positives. Ms. Sawyer is a passionate and eloquent advocate of oral storytelling as an art form unto itself. She draws on a lifetime of experience and travel to argue that the art is worthy of an approach by practitioners that is reverent, rigorous, and passionate. She advocates that storytellers study subjects like music, voice, folklore and culture to deepen their art. There is also a fine selection of folk-tales that comprises the entire second half of the book.

All of this is very good--but in my opinion amounts to little more than a pep-talk for librarians who want to tell stories to children. As proof of this I would cite that when Ms. Saywer revised the book in the Sixties she only added two chapters, one on children's literature and another on adding poetry (for children) to the story hour. Telling stories to children is a fine ambition--it's just not one this reader shares.

However, there is plenty in the book that can be applied to other storytelling venues. But, as the author herself admits in the introduction, she has not written a practical manual on storytelling.

So if, like me, you are looking for practical tips on ways to improve your storytelling (and not just deepen your appreciation for what storytelling can be) then you can safely skip this book.

Although Ruth Sawyer's quaint "The Way of the Storyteller" is more a book about verbal storytelling than it is about written storytelling, there is still much wisdom to be found in its pages.

Sawyer's passion for stories shines through the pages and her rich experiences in interpreting the written word provide some useful guidance for authors. She explores the ancient roots of storytelling and shows how today's stories are inseparable from the patterns of the past.

Sawyer talks of four invariables in story telling:

Experience
The Building of Background
The Power of the Creative Imagination
A Gift for Selection

Experience is what gives a story teller the ability to make the difficulties of her art seem simple; experience comes with writing and writing and writing until the techniques of the art are so ingrained they become invisible.

The building of background is what enriches a story; the opportunity to gather a wide and varied background lies anywhere one looks.

When an artist brings his creative imagination to bear on his material and - from something abstract, from something without form or meaning - transforms it into a real work of inspiration for others to enjoy, this then is the power of the creative imagination.

Sawyer talks of a storyteller knowing which stories to select before entertaining her listeners. There must be an acceptance that some stories are not yours to tell, but belong to another who can tell them better. This gift of selection, too, can apply to writers: what suits one writer's voice may not suit another. And the gift lies in knowing which story suits your own writer's voice.

Written in 1942, revised in 1962, what I found most poignant about Sawyer's recounting of the art of storytelling was her concern that novels - stories told in written form - have become marketable commodities and, as such, have become commonplace. On completing this book one cannot help but wonder if the current woes besetting the publishing industry have their roots in the fact that, for both author and publisher, profit is now placed above the ancient art of storytelling. If the novel is good enough, it will naturally sell as many copies as any author or publisher could ever want.

The one thing I've taken away from this book is that - to be a true teller of stories worthy of all the story tellers who have come before us, from Homer to JK Rowling - the story itself is what matters most. What happens within its boundaries must be inevitable: every story must have an inner integrity and, to have a chance of being read and enjoyed many times over, it must leave the reader completely satisfied by a tale well-written.

"Books are man's rational protest against the irrational, man's pitiful protest against the implacable, man's ideal against the word's real,... man's revelation of the God within him...if the first Prometheus brought fire from heaven in a fennel-stalk, the last will take it back - in a book." (John Cowper Powys "The Enjoyment of Literature" as quoted by Ruth Sawyer in "The Way of The Storyteller")
(Read September 2009; review posted here from my blog)"

The literature will help you see the big picture. Life is all about the detail and it is that detail that one has to focus on when doing a story. The practice of story telling is one in where one must too have lots of experiences, such as? Going on trips and seeing the different cultures and lands of other countries for example along with socializing with people. This also includes reading a lot of books and magazines in order to get ideas. Just read it, and don't judge the book by its cover and i hope you get the material in order to make your storytelling in writing or in oral situations fruitful.

Delightful, inspiring, helpful!
Highly recommended for anyone desiring to tell stories, listen to stories, or just simply appreciate the role of stories in human civilization.

This book is a classic, with tips for tellers and some fine stories at the end of the book. A must for debutant tellers.

This has all the wisdom that a lifetime of storytelling can bring and it's all written down for you. All aspects of storytelling are highlighted and thoughts are discussed, and Ruth Sawyer's rich experience is given.

Stories which are on paper do not have the magical effect. The book gives a deep insight what the art of storytelling is.

I have read this book and it was in the summer of my discontent. And it lifted my weary spirit as a successful and busy African Storyteller, not knowing that this was called 'burn out!'.

Through the reading of The Way of the Storyteller, I realized I had to write the way of the African Storyteller, trying to motivate African and African American children to see how great it was that they were from Africa even though the world consistently tries to convince them that this is a shame and we as Africans are backward and disorganized.

I realized why God had called me to be a storyteller and the great healing art of telling.

I wonder if Ms. Sawyer is still living?

Carroll Durodola