The Lost Honor of Storytelling?

In the spirit of transparency, as a struggling budding author myself, it is terrifyingly easy to become caught up in the humdrum of marketing when the truest pursuit is in the writing. I’m not here to toot my own horn as a storytelling, for in many ways I too fall short. And I’m not here to harp on other writers and their niche or style or goals or any of that crap. I’m here to talk about the lost of honor of storytelling…or if that honor IS lost? The question mark is kind of ambiguous, but when one looks to the flood of new books we see a sort of dilutional hyponatremiahe in the market place. On the other hand, has storytelling kept its honor in the face of saturation? Has storytelling lost its shine, its purpose? Or has it redefined itself? Maybe the answer is obviously both. However, I wonder, even in the evolutionary process, if storytelling has lost sight of depth and meaning and clout to ask uncomfortable questions about society, about ourselves.

Storytelling is an important part in the marketplace of ideas, engaging people emotionally and imaginatively. And the best storytellers are those unabashed to shred some skin, to get up-close and personal to how they feel about the world. This brings me to the origins of horror and camp-fire tales of monsters in the woods and the ole witch on Juniper Hill and so on. I think telling stories is an ingrained attribute in humanity. We have an expressive desire, from paintings of buffalo and deer on cave walls to Otto Dix’s harsh war torn landscape, these are stories come alive, taken from what we see around us. And I’m concerned we’re forgetting how to communicate in that way. And the books that ARE coming out are not being held to that standard. Are we selling products or are we telling stories?

Everyone is on social media nowadays, and I’m not going to rag on that like some old man on a rocking chair sipping whiskey rye and talking about the good ole days. I’m on social media as much as the next nerd. I think its a great way to stay connected while the Information Age flourishes into new generations and new horizons. We have instant access to news around the world and opinions of every shape and form and size. And that’s not the problem. Information; data is good. I think the problem is that we’ve forgotten or never learned how to process all that information, to humanize it, to bring it down a relatable level. And probably even more scary, we’ve forgotten how to listen because we’ve forgotten how to communicate in a way people will WANT to listen. In America alone, within the past several years, we’ve turned politics (our governing systems) into a caricature. The pendulum stances of our two powerhouse political parties have carved a canyon between society, filled with the bones of mutual understanding. Who is to blame? WE ARE! We allow the division to continue, not because we’re not willing to communicate, lots of communication is going on, no, its because we’re not communicating properly, in a way in which both sides would be willing to understand, to be engaged emotionally, spirituality, and humanly. We have sarcastic meme wars instead of emotionally raw book wars.

I honestly believe that the book Uncle Tom’s Cabin did more for the emancipation of slaves than the 600,000 lives lost during the Civil War. And in fact, isn’t that what war boils from, no longer being able to communicate?

Before I clammier down from my soap box, allow we to suggest one of the more important qualities of storytelling: imagination. Without imagination, we’ll lose motivation in forward thinking. What future is there without imagination to see it? Where is passion without imagination? Without imagination, we’ll lose our ability to create hope. And where there is hope there is ultimately an opportunity for transformation and change. Two things that are necessary for us to create a better world for generations to come.