Journalism of Courage
Be it grandmas tales or mythological and historical references,stories have always been regarded as the best medium of imparting knowledge and moral values. They pass on traditions and culture from one generation to another. Somewhere along the way,the concept of storytelling received a setback,because of the increasing hustle-bustle of everyday life. But surprisingly,in the last one month or so,the city has witnessed a surge in the number of storytelling workshops and sessions,in Hindi,Marathi and English. The audience at these sessions isn’t limited to the younger generation; the interesting tales have drawn even curious elders into their fold.
These storytelling sessions have a deep impact on the audience. It provides an analytical insight into the characters, says Swanand Barve,president of Sabdamegh,a city-based theatre group that recently organised a storytelling session on Totochan,a Japanese story of two girls who are a part of an experimental system of education. Barve believes in getting the audiences involved in the story and making the sessions vivid and vibrant so that they experience the story instead of just listening to it.
With families becoming smaller by the day,the children of today are missing out on grandmothers’ tales, points out Swati Raje,president of Bhasha. Children prefer to spend time on social networking sites or digital games. The habit of reading stories should be revived. We as adults should come up with ways of making stories interesting enough to hold the attention of children, she adds. While some tales have stood the test of time and are narrated as they are,others are modified and modernised to suit the present generation audiences at these workshops. At the recent storytelling sessions,the children even drew images of characters,while others enacted the stories.
For some people,these sessions are a way of revisiting old memories. Divya Sewani,a second year sociology student at St Miras,attended the Katha Yatra storytelling workshop. We know of mythological and historical events because of the stories told to us by our elders. My mother used to narrate stories from the life of Krishna,which instilled moral values in us, she says with a smile.
