7.21.2015

The Joy of Listening to a Story

(Storyteller John Weaver at Menlo Park Library)

When we get older, we lose one of those wonderful joys in life: the pleasure of having someone read to you.

I remember as a child sitting on the carpet or grabbing a little mat, and taking a place near the teacher or librarian. While I did like looking at the illustrations in the books, I enjoyed watching the storyteller's expressions just as much. The way each person told the same story was always different, and that added to my love of it.

With my son, I get to experience the delight of listening to stories again. I loved when it was my day to assist in his class, and I could sit with the kids while the teacher read to them. Our local library has fantastic programs. We attended one last month called "Summer Scaries." One of the librarians even told the old window wiper tale. I'm sure you know the one!

Yes, we can listen to audiobooks or attend readings by authors of adult books, but I've found little entertainment in those. Either the author reads in a monotone or adds in their personal inflections which then interferes when I'm reading the book on my own. I like to support my fellow writers, but those readings lack something.

When people read to children, there's a lot more emotion and excitement. The storytelling never fails to be dynamic. They don't only read, they put on a show.

Do you remember listening to stories as a child? Share with us your favorite memory of dynamic storytelling.

23 comments:

  1. My impatient self always wanted to 'read it self'. Mind you, my mother read the Just So Stories to us so often as a child that my brothers and I can still (rather a lot of years later) recite great slabs of several of them. And all of us have our own copies and reread them at intervals.

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    1. I'm the impatient type myself. I can't listen to audiobooks because they don't read fast enough! That's wonderful your mother read to you and your siblings. I hope my son has the same memories of us reading together.

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  2. Audio books always make me sleep. Good post about the joy of listening to stories, my mom always did the story telling. Greetings!

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    1. Thank you and hello! Audiobooks do the same for me.

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  3. Now I want to know what the window wiper tale is. I was a strange child who didn't get much out of storytime. I preferred to read the book by myself. I never liked being read to. I'm such a visual person, though. So I get more out of seeing than hearing.

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    1. You've not heard it? Here's a link to it. ( http://www.boyscouttrail.com/content/story/vinder_viper-128.asp ) It's a short tale and funny when told by a good storyteller. :)

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  4. In school I don't have too many recollections but i did love listening to my dad as he was a great story teller. He was an old timer as one would put it and he had great stories about ghostly encounters, his war time experiences, logging in the old days and his meetings with bears, wolves and moose

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    1. Your father sounds like he had awesome stories!

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  5. I hired a storyteller to read at one of my son's school fundraisers and I was mesmerized along with the kids. LOL.

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    1. That's awesome! I can't wait to see what more opportunities for storytellers my son gets over his school years.

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  6. Not coming from a family of readers, my love of books came from school and the story time reading there. It's a wonderful way to introduce kids to the magic!

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    1. My family didn't really read either. It was heaven for me when I first discovered the library!

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  7. When young, I'd go to story time at the library. My fourth grade teacher used to read to us at 'nap time' in elementary school. I looked forward to that every day. She wasn't overly animated, but she read fantastic stories--Willy Wonky, James and the Giant Peach, etc...

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    1. All the classic good children's stories! Sometimes the stories do the work themselves. :)

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  8. Reading stories is it's own art form, requiring an actor's talents. That's not a skill set most writers have. I do enjoy audio books. Tim Curry does some great work with Garth Nix's books.

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    1. Just listening to Tim Curry speak is fun in itself! Like Alan Rickman. :)

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  9. It's so funny I hopped over to this post. Just today, my daughter asked me to tell her a story. My daughter now has a one year old boy, and I had to chuckle. She said, "I always loved to listen to your stories."

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    1. That's so sweet. I hope my son feels that way one day, or rather, voices that he does!

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  10. Yes, I love listening to stories, and I love reading them out loud. I get all these different nuances from them than I do when I read silently.

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    1. Speaking and silently reading stories can make them seem like two different tales!

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  11. When I was little, we had what we called "Saturday Night Reading Feast" at home. My mother, brother, and I took turns reading aloud from a library book we'd settled on and periodically stopping for to have a sweet snack and then returning to the book until we were finally too sleepy to go on. It certainly instilled for life a love of reading. In recent months I've been reading aloud from my own book at school visits and books signings, and it brought back to me the pleasure of those memories.

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    1. I love the idea of a Saturday Night Reading Feast! That's something I'd love to do with my son.

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  12. Yes, there's nothing like it. My dad used to insert our names for the characters' names. We loved it.

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