Introduced by Holly King

I’d like to tell you a story. The first full-time job I had was in an investment call centre. We were given two weeks of training before being let out ‘on the floor’, and even though I only spent six months there, I was given lots of additional training. I was trained in courses such as how to speak to people, how each person prefers to talk and how to answer their questions in the best way. (I prefer lots of information, but some people just want the headline, and others want to be able to talk without much need of a response other than acknowledgement.) The session that sticks with me most came a month after I began taking calls, and starts like this:

About 12 of us walked into the training room, some holding coffee, some picking up the ever-present tray of biscuits that followed us about in training sessions. The ‘coach’ idly chatted to someone at the front about how they were finding their job since they last met.We congregated with our colleagues we progressed through induction with, who we were split off from when we were divided into investment teams based on our strengths. Then the session started. The coach, David (isn’t it funny how I can remember his name, having spent a total of three weeks with him six years ago?) got us to sit in pairs, facing each other, in a line down the room.

The task was to keep the other person engaged while speaking to them for three minutes straight. Now, this seemed easy to me initially, but it’s inorganic to have someone (who doesn’t regularly lecture or vlog) to just speak at you for that long without your mind wandering, especially if this person isn’t a close friend, or someone you’re invested in. While I can wax lyrical about a variety of topics, I find that conversations need time to ramp up (unless I’m venting to my mum) and, while I spend long periods talking, I also spend long periods listening to responses. It felt odd to imagine speaking ‘at’ someone, and receiving no input from them.

I realised the best way to continuously speak about anything in an engaging way for three minutes was to pick my favourite story and retell it. So I thumbed through my mental index of literature and came up with Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis. It was short enough to re-tell quickly, and weird enough that anyone who hadn’t heard the tale would at least be interested to see where on earth the story went. David started the clock and I began (badly) telling the story of a man providing the sole income for his parents and young sister, who wakes up one day to find out he has transformed into a giant cockroach, and therefore cannot work, and quickly loses all worth in the eyes of his family and society.

Of course, my partner and I won (I can’t remember his name, although I remember his kind face and the fact he had two little girls at the time). I can’t take all the credit; he was a very conscientious person who I believe would have tried encouragingly to listen to me talk about how to cook cabbage for three minutes, but it turned out I was the only person who had a structured narrative planned for the task.

What am I trying to say, other than my theme today is in celebration of National Storytelling Week (30^th Jan – 6^th Feb) I’m trying to show the importance of storytelling, even in such an unlikely setting as a corporate training session. I’m saying that ideas, concepts and truths are important, but you have to know how to impart them for them to hold someone’s attention for longer than 30 seconds, for the seed to take root and grow inside others. Perhaps some stories lay dormant for many years until they reach out onto a page like this, and once again bring up new life. Mostly, I’m trying to tell a story.

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Maire Buonocore is also someone who understands the importance of storytelling, as we find out in our first feature:

Who among us is not a teller of tales, a spinner of yarns? Who is not engrossed in the tittle-tattle of the goings-on in the family, in the neighbourhood, or in the media?

For some, storytelling may have begun at the bedside or the fireside. Growing, we developed a hunger for tales, be it sagas, epics or adventures, through reading books and bonding with favourite authors. I was lost in the land of Fairy Tales. As a child in the forests, I would search for `that` cottage. On the beach, I would strain to hear a distant mermaid. The literature I craved was Tales From Many Lands – all of them – or The Arabian Nights.

While working in an Infant School, ‘story time’ became a highlight. Using props of puppets, hats, toys and musical instruments, stories came to life. Acting out scenarios and using voice changes helped to create convincing characters. Repetition encouraged children`s active participation. It drew them into the story and also gave many speaking confidence. Children laughed, sang, shouted, whispered and, most importantly, always wanted more.

Later, I designed colourful costumes. I wrote rhyming stories. The rhythm gives the story pace and rhyme provides opportunities for predictable endings. This is a useful tool for children who are reluctant readers and for those whose second language is English. I occasionally perform some magic tricks, too, which wow the children. Stories are for everyone. You, too, can lose yourself in the Radio Four ‘Short Story’ or ‘Book At Bedtime’. The young mind, open to learning on so many levels, needs fantasy as well as information in order to develop fully.

In The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock T.S. Eliot wrote:

I hear the mermaids singing each to each.
I do not think that they will sing to me.

However, I’m still listening!