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Living to tell a tale
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Storyteller and writer Muriel Bloch Kenigsberg tells us what it means to spin a tale
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Photo: V. Sudershan
A treasure trove For French storyteller Muriel Bloch stories are a window to the world
She started telling stories to introduce modern art to students and adults at a contemporary art museum in Paris. Twenty years later she is one of the few professional storytellers in the world. Currently attending the International Conference on Sto
rytelling, Muriel Bloch Kenigsberg believes in the power and value of storytelling. Dressed in an orange kurta to match her flaming curls she says, “Storytelling should be everywhere, not just in the schools, but in the streets and in the jails.” Arms in bangles and hands in rings she continues, “We need storytellers not only for entertainment. We need to be connected with the memory of a place.” While stories are most often about war and violence, she finds that the time of storytelling is a time of peace.
To her stories are the passports to the world. They help her learn about different cultures. Stories have proved even cathartic, as happened in Poland. With a grand ease, she narrates, “I’m Jewish. Poland has a terrible story with Jews. Anti-Semitism dates to before the war. My husband’s family is from there. They were killed. Not by the Germans but by the Polish.” Working together with an American, she organised a festival at Chelm (known facetiously as “The town of wise men”). She says that at first the audience were in denial about the atrocities, but slowly, through stories they came to reckon with the past.
Not Mother Goose
Storytelling has been traditionally associated with Mother Goose-like figures. But both the form and content have changed. Bloch says that France was one of the first countries in Europe to see a storytellers’ movement in the early ’80s. She belongs to the first new generation of storytellers. It was a movement born out of the libraries and away from the theatres. People found theatre too removed. Bloch elaborates, “I am not too keen on the traditional. I am interested in city life. I am not telling stories because I think the past was better. But because I think I can tell of today through past symbols.”
This storyteller and author underscores India’s oral tradition. “It’s important to come to India,” she says, “To listen. India’s mythology is so large.” Admitting that she is not very familiar with the epics, she confesses a partiality towards the Panchatantra. Having just returned from Chennai, she is also hoping to translate a few Tulika publications into French. Hailing from a literature background she has published more than 20 storybooks. Alternately whimsical and serious, she says, “I come from books. When stories are in books they are sleeping. I want people to find stories.”
Enjoying collaborative work, she has worked with storytellers from across the world. She performed in Delhi recently with Deepa Agarwal. Her own accompanists include a saxophone player, a guitarist, a percussionist and a singer. But she believes that storytelling should not morph into theatre. “Storytelling should stay simple. And should not be sophisticated. It should be free.”
NANDINI NAIR
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Metro Plus
Bangalore
Chennai
Coimbatore
Delhi
Hyderabad
Kochi
Madurai
Mangalore
Puducherry
Tiruchirapalli
Thiruvananthapuram
Vijayawada
Visakhapatnam
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