The Art of Sims Storytelling
Hi guys! @CathyTea and I were talking, and we thought we'd try making a thread that would be focused solely on writing, especially Sims story writing. The writers' lounge thread is great for being ...
Forum Discussion
I love the term Sacred Story.
I worked as a storyteller for a while--it was one of the most magic jobs I've had. I wanted to reach back as closely as possible to oral tales--and I found transcriptions of oral fairy tales to be some of the most sacred. Grimms was a great source--and I also had this wonderful collection of folk and fairy tales from Appalachia that had been transcribed during the WPA.
So, I got to see the ways that stories healed. This was a small, independent school with smart, talented, quirky kids. I know that in many ways, each of these kids felt like an outsider when it came to the greater world and their place in it. But stories helped them to see where they fit--especially those stories with Simpleton or some small hero who found a way through his or her own sincerity and quirkiness.
One year, two kids had moms who died from breast cancer. Stories became more than a way to see where we fit at that time--they became a way to see that we could make it through the hardest, most challenging and painful times. It took more than story, of course, for these kids and this community to move through that--and story also played a role. One of the boys loved to hear the story of the Juniper tree as often as I would tell it.
I grew up with a sister who's a storyteller--she grew up to become a professional puppeteer with her husband, both dedicated to sacred folk art as a way of communicating and connecting.
During all of my life, story has been both lifeline and interpreter: I can understand the world around me through story.
For me, the sacred part comes with healing and transcendence. I love those stories that give me wings of a dove inside! And I agree that this can come through any medium. It's when we express our deepest meanings. When I think of the SimLit that's touched me deeply this year, it's always been those works in which the writer is expressing her meaning, sharing it. It's not aiming at entertainment or pleasing readers. It's finding the story that brings into expression this meaning within that the writer is longing to see in form.
Art can take so many forms: music, gardens, meals, conversation, painting, drawing, poems, plays, Sim games, stories, and more...
And it's that essence that wants to fill the form that makes it art, to me. That's what makes it sacred, too.
I worked as a storyteller for a while--it was one of the most magic jobs I've had. I wanted to reach back as closely as possible to oral tales--and I found transcriptions of oral fairy tales to be some of the most sacred. Grimms was a great source--and I also had this wonderful collection of folk and fairy tales from Appalachia that had been transcribed during the WPA.
So, I got to see the ways that stories healed. This was a small, independent school with smart, talented, quirky kids. I know that in many ways, each of these kids felt like an outsider when it came to the greater world and their place in it. But stories helped them to see where they fit--especially those stories with Simpleton or some small hero who found a way through his or her own sincerity and quirkiness.
One year, two kids had moms who died from breast cancer. Stories became more than a way to see where we fit at that time--they became a way to see that we could make it through the hardest, most challenging and painful times. It took more than story, of course, for these kids and this community to move through that--and story also played a role. One of the boys loved to hear the story of the Juniper tree as often as I would tell it.
I grew up with a sister who's a storyteller--she grew up to become a professional puppeteer with her husband, both dedicated to sacred folk art as a way of communicating and connecting.
During all of my life, story has been both lifeline and interpreter: I can understand the world around me through story.
For me, the sacred part comes with healing and transcendence. I love those stories that give me wings of a dove inside! And I agree that this can come through any medium. It's when we express our deepest meanings. When I think of the SimLit that's touched me deeply this year, it's always been those works in which the writer is expressing her meaning, sharing it. It's not aiming at entertainment or pleasing readers. It's finding the story that brings into expression this meaning within that the writer is longing to see in form.
Art can take so many forms: music, gardens, meals, conversation, painting, drawing, poems, plays, Sim games, stories, and more...
And it's that essence that wants to fill the form that makes it art, to me. That's what makes it sacred, too.
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