World Storytelling Day

Storytelling is an art.  We all have grown up listening to stories from our elders, teachers and peers right from our childhood.  'World Storytelling Day' is being celebrated on the March equinox (a day on which the duration of day and night are equal and this year it falls on Tuesday, the 20th March 2018) every year all over the world to encourage interested people to tell and listen to stories, forge and nourish the much needed international network.

Storytelling is not just for children.  The art of storytelling can influence almost all fields, including education, training, entertainment, religion, management and even politics! It promotes  creativity, communication skills, personality development, healing, planning, strategizing and what not?

Storytelling basically needs good verbal and non-verbal communication skills.  Value addition may be brought in with the help of costumes, visuals, songs and even the electronic media.

India is a treasure house of stories for all ages.  Long long ago a 

saint named Vishnu Sharma used the technique of teaching his princely students through his 'panchatantra stories'. In order to stimulate interest he created stories involving animals.  Be it the story of the mischievous monkey that got its tail caught, the tortoise that couldn't keep its mouth shut, the clever monkey that escaped from the evil plans of the crocodile or the clever hare that could kill the mighty lion.......there are lessons for all of us to learn. Obviously these stories have reached almost all corners of the world and are counted among the prides of India!

Coming to the contemporary India, R.K.Narayan's 'Malgudi Days'

caught the eyes of crores of Indians glued to the T.V. as a popular serial during mid-1980s. Malgudi is a fictional village (some say it is the combination of first three letters of Malleswaram and last four letters of Basavanagudi of Bengaluru) where the little boy 'Swamy and his friends' lived. Swamy is monitored by his strict father, loved by his mother and pampered by his grandma.  But Swamy loved freedom and time with his friends and the story unfolds in the form of 39 serials.  Swamy's hate for his school, love for cricket, exploratory visits to the nearby forests, his innocent mischiefs are all captured as short stories.  For most of we seniors, seeing this T.V. serial was almost like reliving our humble childhoods!

In the recent past, we saw two great children movies in English.  One was the famous 'The Jungle Book', based on a story written by 

Rudyard Kippling. Mowgli was a boy who grew along with wolves.  When the the wild tiger wanted to kill him, he was saved by his two friends.....a bear and a panther.

Yann Mortel authored 'Life of Pi', was the story of young Pi who had to seek refuge for survival in a life boat inside the mid-sea along with a hyena and a tiger. Enough ingredients for an exciting climax which we all enjoyed with our children.

Storytelling is all about creativity and innovation.  The familiar

story of hare and the tortoise is now twisted in three more different ways to draw new management lessons!  Look at the pic.  The repentant hare which didn't rest in the middle won in the second version, proving that fast and consistently fast wins the race.  In the next version, the clever tortoise changed the track to land-water and won the race again sending a new message....choose the track according to your strength to win.  Finally both the animals realized that it is better to 'collaborate' instead of 'competing'.  They ran the race together on land-water track, by coordinating with each other and achieved the mutually beneficial win-win!

Creativity of our great minds and their tweaking instincts 

have not even left our great epics....Ramayan and Mahabharath!

Arguably the greatest Indian novelist (Kannada) of our times Mr. S.L.Bhyrappa has rewritten these two epics giving a realistic touch.

Mr. Bhyrappa's master piece 'Parva' (published during 1979 and translated to almost all Indian languages including Sanskrit and English) is a recreated story of Mahabharat.  No miracles here and even Krishna is described as a ordinary human being who was a shrewd politician of his times. When Kauravas wanted to insult Draupadi by disrobing her, her five great husbands were helpless. Distraught Draupadi had to shout at Kauravas.....'you might have won my husbands.  Remember that Lord Krishna is on my side and he will teach you all a lesson'. Kauravas, scared of Krishna stopped pulling the saree further and Draupadi's honour was saved. This is how Mr. Bhyrappa has described the miracle of 'akshaya vastra' within the limits of reality.

Mr.Bhyrappa's Ramayan (published 2017) is renamed as 'Uttara Kaanda',  which is rewritten as a flash-back of reminiscent Seeta, of her life with Lord Ram. Seeta is not a passive lady here. Towards the end she dares questioning Ram and even refuses to join him back! She chooses to take up agriculture to make her living and dies on the field while doing her work, contrary to the popular belief that the mother-earth opened up to take her away!


So much about stories, what about great story tellers and their different forms of art?

Be it the 'Harikatha' (top-left) of the south, 'patachitra (top-right) of the east, 'Pandavani' (down-left) of the centre or 'Katputhli' of the north.......they are all Indian ways of storytelling with the help of acting, songs, pictures and puppets.

How this great art of storytelling is being taken forward?

The Indian Storytelling Network (ISN) was founded by Smt.Geeta Ramanujam (director of Kathalaya, Bengaluru) during 2011. The objective of ISN includes networking with similar bodies all over the world and facilitating the development of storytelling in India. For more details one may e mail to info@indianstorytellingnetwork.org OR kathalaya@gmail.com
                                                -0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Wish you all a happy Yugadi and a happy new year!


I have made references to many sites and drawn info and pictures from them.  I acknowledge my indebtedness to all of them.  

I thank you all for your patient reading.  Please send me your valuable feedback. 

klakshminarayana1956@rediffmail.com
Mob & Whatsapp No. 98455 62603
fb: Lakshminarayana Krishnappa