Anansi Stories, are they for everyone to tell?

[Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller]

(Just a little venting)
I just had a comment sent to me that made me mad. The comment: "You can't tell Anansi Stories, you're not black."
What!!! I was unaware that you needed to be black to tell stories from Africa or the West Indies. If that is so, then you need to be Chinese to tell Chinese stories, or you need to be Native American to tell Native American Stories, Or you need to be German to tell The Grimm Brother's Fairytales Or you need to be Dead to tell Ghost Stories. That is not Right.
As a Storyteller it is my responsibility to keep Oral Traditions alive, All Of Them, if I can. If the story is a sacred story, I use caution, I don't wish to offend those who hold it sacred. And when I tell Anansi Stories, I try to stay true to Anansi. As Anansi told many stories of how he felt persecuted for being himself, I think he would like to hear anyone tell his stories.
(I just had to get that out)
Thanks
Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller

[Layne Gneiting]

Agreed. To children, all stories are theirs. They don't distinguish among adult-defined boundaries. They just accept. I remember feeling intimately connected (in childhood) with the Native Americans, Japanese, Africans, Germans, South Americans. I pored over folktales of all cultures, and found myself tenderly sharing joys and pains as only a child can. Although I didn't (and couldn't) fully understand and appreciate the cultural backgrounds and suffering, I could identify with the stories. It jolted me to the core when, in grad school, puffed-up professors touted that tellers are only empowered to tell stories from their (the teller's) tradition. Fine. My tradition happens to be the world's tales. As long as I retain a spiritual (or other type of) connection, I claim a right to the tale. Note, I don't have a right to the culture, but tales belong to the world's children. While I recognize that it's a hot issue for some, I also appreciate your frustration, Daniel. I will continue telling Spider stories, and I hope you and many, many others do, too.

[Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller]

Thank you Layne.
I knew I wasn't alone. I will tell the stories that speak to my heart. They are my Tradition and culture. I'm glad to say that the comment came from a lawyer and not a storyteller but...
Thanks again and Keep telling
Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller

[David S. Sharp]

Hi Daniel

They sound pretty silly. For musicians the comments I've heard are "only Jewish and Black musicians should be allowed to play Jazz." Since that was the cultural melting process Jazz came from. Or my friend whose name was Kurumada of Japanese decent being told "you can't be an expert and write articles on the Bulgarian and Hungarian Bagpipes". Called the Gaida and Duda respectively. Keeping culture alive and telling stories is how we all get to know something about one another far away places. Values taught can come from many cultures and telling stories let's us see we are not so very different from one another in the first place. My family is decended from Pioneers in our area, but I would hate for that to be the only type of story I could tell. I love making Japanese Shakuhachi and Hawaiian Ohe Hano Ihu from bamboo. I would hate to think that makes everything I've made along those lines invalid. I'm also planning to tell some respectful stories from those cultures with music. What better way to honor others. I like the comment that "you need to be dead to tell Ghost Stories"! Last of all many a comment comes from the realm of being creativly blocked. Some people are happiest when they can put a bump in your road as you go happily along creating things. Good work and what a great comment, it certainly gets a person thinking.

Dave Sharp
Glastonbury

[Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller]

Dave, it's good to hear from you
I'm glad that I can listen to Jazz. (I still can't play) I'm glad I can tell Stories. It is through the spreading of culture that we can finally be one and at peace. And Yes, I'm glad I don't have to be dead to tell ghost stories. (I hope when I am dead that I still can. Wouldn't that be creepy. There is a story in that.)
Thanks again and I hope to hear you again soon
Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller

[David S. Sharp]

Hi Dan
Carol and I got told once years ago we weren't the real deal because we were'nt born in Scotland. Our ancestors came from there four generations ago, but the person who made the comment told us that doesn't count. We thought that was pretty funny and tell each other that when we are on a creative break through. So when ever we worry about what someone has said, we know we're on the right track so to speak.

Ghost stories are such a great idea in the first place and "when I'm dead I hope I can still tell stories". There is a really cool creepy story in that.

Thanks again for the inspiration,

Dave Sharp - Glastonbury

[Scot AnSgeulaiche]

Good evening, Dead Daniel (yup, I see a story being collectively written on this post).
In 1960s Manchester, during the very trad and modern folk revival which led to bands like Steeleye Span, Pentangle, Fairport Convention etc, the great folk singer Ewan McColl stood up one night and said that musos should only play folk music from their own tradition.

I think he mostly wanted to set the cat among the pigeons, which he did. He was a passionate carer about tradition, both his own and other peoples'. He was upset that people were dropping in and out of different cultures' folk traditions as suited, without really understanding them and I suspect giving fairly cliched, shallow renditions of good songs.

I understand where he was coming from and also the notion (if not your specific experience) that one needs to be from a culture to tell its (anansi) stories.

But if we never left our own culture then we'd all be a bit self referential and possibly nationalistic.

There is a balance in this process. One I am happy to play with. I tend to come down on the side of "stick to my own culture" but that's more to do with my raison d'etre.

It's always good to be challenged by the "but you're not black" type statement. I've been prompted by such questions in the past to re-examine what I do.

I've come to use a different test, myself: Is the story really YOURS? Are you a part of it and it you? Are you IN this story? Do you GET this Tale on some deeper level? Then it doesn't really matter which culture or tradition the Tale calls home because it now belongs to YOU, it's YOUR culture, and you can say so with integrity to the Tale.

Now, if you WERE to be Dead and tell ghost stories, what would that Tale be about?

[Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller]

Scot
To call a story "Mine" is in my opinion can only happen if I created it, Idea, Work and Story. I can call the telling "Mine". And as Anansi tells "all stories are Anansi Stories, even this one."
Do you get offended when someone tell a Scottish Story, Like Dave was saying? I hope if they tell it well and respect the tale, that you don't. I'm not Scottish, but my heart races when I hear the pipes. I tell stories that make me happy and I long to be there. (or not be there in the case of Ghost Stories) With my mixed blood and wandering heart (and sometimes mind) I, like Layne claim the world as my culture. I say Storytelling is a calling, and that calling is to tell the stories. We each should tell the stories that call to us. I Hate to JK you but , like the wand choosing the wizard, the story choices the teller. And the teller must tell. (Soap Box, Sorry)
Thanks and Keep telling
Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller

[Scot AnSgeulaiche]

If I hear a non-Scot telling a Scottish Tale and tell it well, then I usually learn something about the Tale (if I knew it before) or learn something about life (if I didn't know it before). That's grand altogether!

I presided over a wedding recently (in my tradition bearer role) and I heard a Lowland Scot read a poem by the great the Lowland dialect poet, Robert Burns, "My love is like a red red rose". He killed it.

In mid ceremony, I was tempted to shout "Do it again! This time like you meant it!".

If ye canny recite Burns with some spirit and preferably with a fair stab at the dialect (as many a foreigner has managed just grand) then don't touch the man's words.

I think that applies to recounting any cultural piece. It has to be done with a respect, a level of understanding, if not of the culture first hand then from an understanding of the Tale/song/poem on some personally relevant level, so that the Tale means something to the teller. This is what I mean by "mine/yours". As you put it, "The wand calling the wizard" the Tale finds you and asks you to tell it. Ce la memme.

These are precious gems; we can set them in a new surround, as long as they are still held as gems.

Can't abide Victorian sanitisations and editing of Tales. As if they knew better how to end a Tale that had been told for 3000 years just fine. Pah! It's like taking the animal cruelty / child abuse /scary out of Grimm.

Walt Disney needs a good kicking. Seven DWARFs my ar**: they were seven strapping, competent, skillful, TALL brothers (who were symbolic of seven arts/skills in the psyche of Snow White) in the many original versions.

Oh, the closet marked "rants" has been opened now. They are all falling out.

[Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller]

Scot
I see we are on the same page. Here Here on the Burns, Amen on the Grimm’s (although some adaptation are good as long as the original is respected) and All right on the Disney. (in my Grimm’s it reads Dwarfs, the seven skills I heard before but tell me, Where are the Tall Brothers? I would like to hear that one.) All in all Tell it like you mean it, love it like a child, and respect the stone that gave it life.
Tell on my friend, tell on.

and now on a fun note

Candace ask "Who's next?" The room was silent as the teen still tried to digest the last words that Robert had spoken. After a time, Kim rased her hand.
"Kim? You have a story?" Candace asked not hiding her surprise.
"No... But I think he does..." Kim pointed at the corner by the old stove. Every one jumped. No one had seen the man sitting there. He was a big man, with a thin beard, with eyes that seemed to look into you rather than at you.
Kevin was on his feet, "Who are you?" he demanded.
"My name is Daniel," he said "and I... well... Live here." Everyone started to stir. This old house was a perfect place to tell ghost stories, no one though anyone still lived here.
"Don't go!" the man said "I have enjoyed your stories so much. I felt like I should tell you mine. I use to tell ghost stories for a living you know." No one moved. "May I?" The man motioned for every one to get comfortable. Then he began. "It all started on a dark canyon road--"

Daniel Bishop, the Storyteller

[Scot AnSgeulaiche]

As the original thread of this post wanders off down canyon road...

As the old man began his Tale, he got slowly to his feet, unfolding like a creaking chest lid. His movements looked painful, as if one could hear the reluctance of his bones. But there was no sound, no shuffle of feet, no shush of clothing, nothing at all, save his thin voice with a strange timbre to it, like the echo, but not the original sound.

He moved from the fire corner to the empty seat, the Seat for the Stranger, as many would call it. He sat down as silent as a feather coming to rest, as if the whole purpose of this empty seat tradition was so that he could take up his rightful place - "the one who will come". A feeling washed over the audience, more conscious to some than others, that "it", the stranger, had come. This was what the gathering had been for, just that they didn't know it at the time.

His unassuming voice carried them along. "The canyon road was not much used back then as there was only Mrs MacGilvray down near the old saw mill. Her husband used to be the miller, before ... before... well, we'll get to that later."

[Marc Young]

Unless you are totally identified on a psychological, sociological, historic, cultural and genetic basis with a particular tribe, era or region, you can't possibly tell their stories with any authenticity or integrity. This type of cultural colonialist klepto-triumphalism has gone on long enough. Therefore I call upon the other monotheistic faiths of the world to return all stories, theological premises and moral/ethical values they have appropriated from the Hebrew Bible over the past 2000 years to their original owners.

Or if that idea doesn't sound feasible, perhaps we could just loosen up about borrowing the elements of a good story no matter who we heard it from. ALL communication is interpretation. I'm down with the jazz/gumbo approach of combining whatever ingredients present themselves in an inspired improvisation. It's creative artistry that makes it tasty, not the pedigree.

[Layne Gneiting]

I like your style, Marc. Bravo!

Layne