OBJECTIVE OBJECTIVE STORY TELLING
Does story telling have to have an objective?
Does story telling need be objective?
I told a short story during a club meeting of Toastmasters International. The narrative was banal. I reminisced of two
episodes which occurred in airports, where I needed to go the restroom.
With well over two thousands commercial flight
segments in my air travel history, I walked inadvertently into a women’s restroom. I must have been tired, or in one case at the
Charles De Gaulle airport I misread the sign. Probably expected to see a Women sign
but alas in French it read Dames.
Inside I looked around and there were only closed stalls. I wondered, where are the urinals in Paris?
Then a jolt hit my mind – I’m in the wrong
restroom. I felt scared, what if some
gendarme lady will walk in and take some legal action against my act of
trespassing?
I ran out for my life. I was scared and embarrassed.
How could it happen to me?
Yes. I was jet-lagged and tired after a transatlantic
flight. But still there could be no
excuse for my transgression. What excuse would I tell the sitting Magistrate if
taken to court?
Some twenty years later the same happened to me in
an airport on American soil.
Relax. During
both episodes no female was in the restroom. I was twice lucky.
#
Now years later I tell my story to entertain my
fellow club members. The pay-off was
returned to me with giggles and chuckles.
As the protocol calls in this ninety-four years old public
speaking organization, a club member “evaluated” my “speech”. Evaluation in the jargon of Toastmasters
means – critiquing the content and delivery of the story.
The gist of the criticism was that my speech lacked an objective. I should have stated that this real life
story had an objective - a purpose – and declare the objective ahead of time.
I was probably expected to state as an objective something
like,
“Make sure that you avoid the other sex bathrooms”.
Or maybe,
“For your personal safety and others, ensure that you walk into a same sex
bathroom consistent with your congenital sex”.
I think that the Evaluator’s objective was to tell
us that my story was purposeless. In
that case I agree.
In the social circles of the self-improvement
community you must have a goal.
#
I went home and started to think. I asked myself, do story telling have to have
an objective?
The immediate reaction in my mind was - do
Shakespeare’s works have an objective?
If you know the answer, enlighten me.
Next, I asked myself what is the objective of the
seven volumes of Harry Potter’s book stories?
The word “Objective” in the English language has two
meanings. One meaning is impartiality. The second meaning is a goal.
Story telling is an old art that was practiced by
ancient cavemen who sat around a bonfire and told stories that passed down
generations to come.
Nowadays storytelling is intended to entertain the listeners the same as the
art of painting does to stir an emotion in the viewers.
Same applies to composing and playing music.
Most stories are told for entertainment sake. Rarely do stories have a moral to them.
William Shakespeare was a genius story teller of the
English language. Yet he never left
England. He wrote plays set in Italy
like The Merchant of Venice, Romeo and Juliet.
He wrote about the Roman Empire and Julius Caesar but those stories were
all products of his fertile imagination. There was his queen Cleopatra, yet he
never visited Egypt.
Get this – Shakespeare wrote and told stories to entertain his audience. Shakespeare’s
objective was to earn a living from his dramatized stories played on stage. His objective was to earn money from the
entertained the audience.
That was the unspoken objective but the objective truth about the great William
Shakespeare.
What is the objective in the series of seven Harry
Potter story books?
The three early volumes are two to three hundred
pages long and the four last volumes are over six hundred pages each!
That’s a lot of printed words, telling imagined stories.
So are there objectives or a message in the Harry Potter series.
Well, there is none.
The stories are fascinating, hallucinating and written as a show of the wizardly
literary talent of Joanne Rowling.
There were attempted guesses about the message or the “objective”. May be the books about love (Lily). Some critics say it’s about death (Voldemort).
R. K. Rowling said in her graceful commencement
address to graduating 2008 class of Harvard students that she was “morally
neutral” in the Harry Potter series.
Harry Potter has no message but has an unwritten
objective – to create a billion dollars industry. Including print, merchandise, and movies… And
indeed it did.
By now you may start to agree that storytelling is
an art that may not include an
objective.
The art of storytelling - is the
objective.
#
Not yet satisfied?
Have you heard the story about the Little Red Capp Girl by the Brothers Grimm? Does
this story have an objective? Enlighten
me.
Take the story of Goldilocks and The Three Bears.
Read it and come up with your own concluded objective or message. If you can. Lots of social and psychological literature
was written over this story. Including
some oedipal interpretations…
Miguel De Cervantes published in 1605 a novel titled
Don Quixote. It is one of the greatest literary works of
Western literature. It was translated to
most world languages. The story is about
a man who lost his mind to become a chivalrous knight.
Among other things he went fighting the blades of a
wind mill that he envisioned as the enemy.
Tilting at windmills is an English idiom that means
attacking imaginary enemies. The expression is derived from Don Quixote, and
the word "tilt" in this context refers to jousting.
The phrase is sometimes used to describe either confrontation
where adversaries are incorrectly perceived, on misinterpreted or misapplied
heroic, romantic, or idealistic justifications.
Literary critics never agreed if Don Quixote is a
tragedy or a comedy. Miguel De Cervantes
did not intend that his story’s objective is the enrichment of the Spanish
language.
#
Storytelling is an art as painting is an art.
Painters are glad to tell their viewers that their
artwork is intended to elicit an emotional reaction from the viewer.
What is the objective in Jackson Pollock’s paintings of colorful blots and
stains?
Minority of artwork was created to be an intentional
objective to carry a message.
It’s hard to say that Pablo Picasso’s paintings and
sculpture art have an objective. His artwork
reflected mostly his view of life as expressed in the styles of surrealism and
cubism.
Yet, when Picasso intended to – he had an objective.
The great example of art with an objective is his “Guernica”
painting. It was created as a humanistic
political protest against Spain’s fascist regime during the Spanish Civil War.
While Guernica had
an objective (purpose), it was not
objective (not impartial). Guernica is a subjective
work of art that expressed an objective
message.
#
Johann Sebastian Bach composed for and virtuously
played the organ in the beginning of the 18th century. J. S. Bach wrote over one thousand pieces of
music. He fathered twenty children of
whom ten lived and grew to adulthood. J. S. Bach composed and played his genius
music to entertain his employers – the princes of and dukes. Providing food for
his family was the objective of his musical work. His divine music was a by-product that we
still enjoy today.
#
The Holy Bible has stories. It has many stories. Majority of the stories are told in
conjunction with lesson learned intent. Yet some salacious stories are just
that and with no identifiable objective.
For example is the incest of Lot, or the adultery of King David.
I studied the stories of the bible. I was interested with how the Biblical
stories demonstrate the Law of Attraction in life and action. The Law of
Attraction as we know it was not widely known in Biblical times. Only talented leaders and gifted wise men
knew The Secret.
I published two books on the subject.
#
My take home message is - story telling is an art and not a
scientific report.
Every listener to a story has to keenly observe, on
their own, for a possible objective, whether implied or explicit.
#
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