When I watched Imtiaz Ali’s Tamasha a few months ago, I remember being less than impressed. I bemoaned the lack of taut cinema, the lack of Deepika Padukone and much, much else. I was, however, enchanted by something I thought at the time was completely revolutionary. A young man (Ranbir Kapoor) gives up his job as a corporate ladder-climber to metamorphose into a beautiful, dramatic storyteller.
A storyteller.
Did such things exist beyond the ambit of our extended childhood fantasies? Surely, people didn’t just turn into adult versions of their childhood selves – and manage to spin a whole profession out of it?
Turns out, I couldn’t have been more wrong. Many, many people have realised the need to let the stories out of Aladdin’s lamp, out of star-spangled camping bags – and into the “grown-up” universe.
And the grown-up universe? Has been particularly encouraging. Case in point: The British Council has been organising ‘Kathakar’ – the International Storytellers Festival – in India since 2011 with great success. Storytelling, which is inextricably linked with India (think folklore), saw a revival in the UK in the 1980’s. Today, storytelling in the UK is everywhere – in galleries, museums, theatres and on radio, for both children and adult audiences.
Kathakar attempts to bring the same holistic experience to India. This year’s edition saw renowned oral storytellers such as Giles Abbott, Emily Hennessey and Tim Ralphs.
How Spinning Tales Can Turn You Into a Different Person
It isn’t just restricted to festivals and mela grounds. Storytelling is something many individuals in India – much like Ranbir’s character in Tamasha – have taken up as a profession.
Rituparna Ghosh, founder of Your Story Bag – an organisation that, quite simply, tells stories – elucidates beautifully the passion that makes a true storyteller. Ghosh, after all, gave up a lucrative 8-year-long career at Times Now to be one.
“I love the person I become when I tell stories. I feel like I’m two different people – one, when I’m telling stories and the other, when I’m not. And honestly? I prefer that version of me that’s telling the stories.”
Eerily similar to the lines that Ali had Kapoor mouth in the movie (when he turns from docile office-goer to vibrant orator).
Ghosh, in fact, insists that it takes no special skills to become a storyteller.
“Everybody already is a storyteller,” she insists. “My mother, my naani, the autowallah who strikes up a conversation with me – are all telling stories. The real challenge is how much you want it when the professional hurdles pop up.”
Why Storytelling is Such a Niche
She isn’t off the mark. Storytelling is still a relatively niche market, and according to Ghosh, “professionally, a very unorganised one.”
There isn’t a lot of money in it. Often, a lot of MNCs which call me to train their employees just assume I work for free! You’ll need to be ready for all this when you’re committing to becoming a storyteller.Rituparna Ghosh, Founder, Your Story Bag
How Corporate Honchos are Learning From Storytellers
Storytelling seems to have moved seamlessly from the festival circuit to boardrooms.
But what do storytellers really teach corporate honchos – presumed to be a jaded lot, tucked far, far away from pixie dust?
Ameen Ul Haque, founder of The Storywallahs – a Bangalore-based company that specialises in storytelling – weighs in:
“Corporate clients learn a lot from storytelling workshops. For one, they learn to be good storytellers – which is a key leadership skill. They tell stories to inspire their team, keep them motivated... Stories also help in conflict resolution and negotiation. Then, a lot of their work involves data and numbers. How do you make that interesting? We teach them to weave data into narratives.”
If only the surge of corporate interest in storytellers also translated to respect. Ghosh observes:
“If you look at the international scene, you’ll find that there are storytellers in Africa, Morocco, Singapore, who move to more developed countries for their craft. They’re respected. Audiences look up to them when they hear who they are. Here, not a lot of people are willing to invest time or money to attend a storytelling programme.”
Of Uninhibitedness and Pixie Dust
Also, now that storytellers have happily shattered the myth that stories are merely for children, one wonders – how differently do the two age groups react to stories?
“People no longer assume that storytelling is something only kids enjoy,” agrees Ghosh.
“But adults and kids react differently – while children are greedy for stories, adults are a lot more inhibited and shy in the beginning. You can see them open up, though, as the story goes on, and that is a wonderful thing to see.”
Both Ghosh and Haque speak of having jumped into this without fear.
“I knew that making a living from performances alone would not be easy – but I followed my gut,” says Haque.
The hope is simple, really.
If the world started having more conversations amongst themselves and telling each other stories, it would be a world peppered with far more pixie dust, star-spangled camping bags and laughter.
(At The Quint, we are answerable only to our audience. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Because the truth is worth it.)