Storytelling: A Global Experience

Notes for storytelling:

Speaking for the Alpha Delta Kappa International Convention on Wednesday was a great experience. As an avid story collector and devotee of oral communication, it was a delight to have hundreds of educator academians enjoy hearing about story characters, origins, plots, and how tales had formed---actually intertwined---after immigrants in the New World intermarried and combined stories from their cultures.

Most of my colleagues probably find my endless fascination with global stories and cultures rather boring. But after twenty years of research, introspection, and interpretation, I came to terms a few years ago. I am hooked. I remain reading and researching stories of the world---my preservationist spirit continues to rise.

I am the person who could never part with the family farm (if I had one). And, most of all, I understood what Ray Hicks, the greatest of all Jack Tales tellers, meant when he said, "Anyone can tell a Jack tale anyway he wants to, but I tell the real Jack tales." And, that he did. He spoke Elizabethan words mixed with Southern Appalachian colloquialisms when he told stories. And, he told tales handed down through his family, mostly his beloved granddaddy Benjamin Franklin Hicks.

Once, a collegue with a Ph.D. in folklore said, "But Ray also knows about modern things."

And, that he did. He could work on a car engine and rebuild a chain saw. He also had a few neighbors who dropped by for a haircut.  Yet, Ray avoided modern things and never owned a telephone or indoor plumbing. But, one thing's for sure, I never heard him speak with a non-regional voice. He was Appalachian through and through. He was the mountain man that mentally never entered the new millenium.

Story came to me years before I began thinking in story. For I first wrote non-fiction books based on historical places. Then I became fascinated with people who knew the stories of their family three to five generations back. It reminded me of the many times my mom related how our family came from a long line of talkers.

History delivers an infinite number of stories. Inspiration comes from how a storyteller binds the audience with a common theme, a common purpose, and an identifiable main character.

Ray Hicks brought thousands upon thousands of people into the story world by spinning yarns about Jack. He put Jack, the everyman, in historical Appalachian settings. Jack did the same chores that every boy or young adult over the age of twelve or thirteen was expected to do as far back as 1775.

Even though Ray set forth his tellings with great humor (he often laughed along with the audience) he also paused to say, "Now, there's truth in this."

He knew stories had to deliver a lesson. After all, people three hundred years before educated their children through stories. Even before the days of public education, parents taught children to stay out of the woods by relating monster stories. They were much more effective than simply looking at a child and saying, "Now, stay out of the forest because you might get hurt." That monster, ferocious dragon, or fierce giant in the woods, made all children think twice before they ventured out of the homeplace clearing and into a deep dark woods.

Everyone knows what happened to Hansel and Gretel.

Ray kept Jack true to his Appalachian roots. Even though the Hicks family settled in North Carolina in the early 1700s, Jack was more of a mountain man than a North Carolinian. I don't think Ray ever referred to his home state. He would say, "Mountain country or this country." As much as he added real life to folklore, Ray taught me that history can turn on a dime due to personal interpretation.

Anyone can create a good story by establishing a scenario and picking a name that appeals to a broad segment of society. That sets the stage for creatiing stories that appeal to a large group. Jack works well because Jack was and is a common name in the United States. Hiro would be a better name in Japan, in the same way that Emilio would work in Italy and Hans in Germany. These "everymen" could be set on a farm in any country and as long as the audience could understand the language of the storyteller, many people would be bound via their common knowledge of farm life that might have come through their personal experiences or through visiting grandparents.

So, Ray Hicks gave stories to the world. He chose to be a preservationist. He knew this was his calling. It gave his life meaning beyond the Jack-of-all-trades types of jobs he engaged in to support his family.

Jack may have been an English creation, but when he moved to Appalachia the stories became rich with southern references. Ray Hicks was known for saying, "Jack was up agin it." He also said that he was often "up agin it." This was only a tiny part of his language that made the Jack Tales his tales. By creating their own world for Jack will help create a new Jack Tale no matter who the teller is.

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