CHAPTER I._The Art of Story-Telling

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THE ART OF STORY-TELLING

THE ART

OF STORY-TELLING

BY MARIE L. SHEDLOCK

WITH A PREFACE BY

PROFESSOR JOHN ADAMS

CHAIR OF EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY OF LONDON

LONDON

JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W.

1915

CONTENTS.

PAGE

PREFACE vii

INTRODUCTION 1

Chapter I. THE DIFFICULTIES OF STORY-TELLING CONNECTED WITH LIBRARIES

AND CLUBS 6

” II. THE ESSENTIALS OF STORY-TELLING 25

” III. THE ARTIFICES OF STORY-TELLING 32

” IV. ELEMENTS TO AVOID 42

” V. ELEMENTS TO SEEK 61

” VI. HOW TO OBTAIN AND MAINTAIN THE EFFECT 89

” VII. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 117

” VIII. LIST OF STORIES TOLD IN FULL 138

LIST OF TITLES OF INDIVIDUAL STORIES AND OF COLLECTIONS OF STORIES 210

INDEX 235

PREFACE.

By PROFESSOR JOHN ADAMS,

_Chair of Education, University of London_.

THOSE who do not love schoolmasters tell us that the man who can do

something supremely well contents himself with doing it, while the man

who cannot do it very well must needs set about showing other people

how it should be done. The masters in any craft are prone to magnify

their gifts by maintaining that the poet--or the stove-pipe maker--is

born, not made. Teachers will accordingly be gratified to find in the

following pages the work of a lady who is at the same time a brilliant

executant and an admirable expositor. Miss Shedlock stands in the very

first rank of story-tellers. No one can claim with greater justice that

the gift of Scheherazade is hers by birthright. Yet she has recognised

that even the highest natural gifts may be well or ill manipulated:

that in short the poet, not to speak of the stove-pipe maker, must take

a little more trouble than to be merely born.

It is well when the master of a craft begins to take thought and to

discover what underlies his method. It does not, of course, happen

that every master is able to analyse the processes that secure him

success in his art. For after all the expositor has to be born as well

as the executant; and it is perhaps one of the main causes of the

popularity of the born-not-made theory that so few people are born both

good artists and good expositors. Miss Shedlock has had this rare

good fortune, as all those who have both read her book and heard her

exemplify her principles on the platform will readily admit.

Let no one who lacks the gift of story-telling hope that the following

pages will confer it. Like Comenius and like the schoolmaster in

Shakespeare, Miss Shedlock is entitled to claim a certain capacity or

ingenuity in her pupils, before she can promise effective help. But

on the other hand let no successful story-teller form the impression

that he has nothing to learn from the exposition here given. The best

craftsmen are those who are not only most able but most willing to

learn from a fellow master. The most inexperienced story-teller who has

the love of the art in his soul will gather a full harvest from Miss

Shedlock's teaching, while the most experienced and skilful will not go

empty away.

The reader will discover that the authoress is first and last an

artist. “Dramatic joy” is put in the forefront when she is enumerating

the aims of the story-teller. But her innate gifts as a teacher will

not be suppressed. She objects to “didactic emphasis” and yet cannot

say too much in favour of the moral effect that may be produced by the

use of the story. She raises here the whole problem of direct _versus_

indirect moral instruction, and decides in no uncertain sound in

favour of the indirect form. There is a great deal to be said on the

other side, but this is not the place to say it. On the wide question

Miss Shedlock has on her side the great body of public opinion among

professional teachers. The orthodox master proclaims that he is, of

course, a moral instructor, but adds that in the schoolroom the less

_said_ about the matter the better. Like the authoress, the orthodox

teacher has much greater faith in example than in precept: so much

faith indeed that in many schools precept does not get the place it

deserves. But in the matter of story-telling the artistic element

introduces something that is not necessarily involved in ordinary

school work. For better or for worse modern opinion is against the

explicitly stated lesson to be drawn from any tale that is told. Most

people agree with Mark Twain's condemnation of “the moral that wags its

crippled tail at the end of most school-girls' essays.”

The justification of the old-fashioned “moral” was not artistic but

didactic. It embodied the determination of the story-teller to see

that his pupils got the full benefit of the lesson involved. If the

moral is to be cut out, the story-teller must be sure that the lesson

is so clearly conveyed in the text that any further elaboration would

be felt as an impertinent addition. Whately assures us that men

prefer metaphors to similes because in the simile the point is baldly

stated, whereas in the metaphor the reader or hearer has to be his own

interpreter. All education is in the last resort self-education, and

Miss Shedlock sees to it that her stories compel her hearers to make

the application she desires.

In two other points modern opinion is prepared to give our authoress

rein where our forefathers would have been inclined to restrain

her. The sense of humour has come to its proper place in our

schoolrooms--pupils' humour, be it understood, for there always was

scope enough claimed for the humour of the teacher. So with the

imagination. The time is past when this “mode of being conscious” was

looked at askance in school. Parents and teachers no longer speak

contemptuously about “the busy faculty,” and quote Genesis in its

condemnation.

Miss Shedlock has been well advised to keep to her legitimate subject

instead of wandering afield in a Teutonic excursion into the realms of

folk-lore. What parents and teachers want is the story as here and now

existing and an account of how best to manipulate it. This want the

book now before us admirably meets.

JOHN ADAMS.

INTRODUCTION.

STORY-TELLING is almost the oldest Art in the world--the first

conscious form of literary communication. In the East it still

survives, and it is not an uncommon thing to see a crowd at a

street-corner held by the simple narration of a story. There are signs

in the West of a growing interest in this ancient art, and we may yet

live to see the renaissance of the troubadours and the minstrels whose

appeal will then rival that of the mob orator or itinerant politician.

One of the surest signs of a belief in the educational power of the

story is its introduction into the curriculum of the Training-College

and the classes of the Elementary and Secondary Schools. It is just at

the time when the imagination is most keen--the mind being unhampered

by accumulation of facts--that stories appeal most vividly and are

retained for all time.

It is to be hoped that some day stories will only be told to school

groups by experts who have devoted special time and preparation

to the art of telling them. It is a great fallacy to suppose that

the systematic study of story-telling destroys the spontaneity of

narrative. After a long experience, I find the exact converse to be

true, namely, that it is only when one has overcome the mechanical

difficulties that one can “let oneself go” in the dramatic interest of

the story.

By the expert story-teller I do not mean the professional elocutionist.

The name--wrongly enough--has become associated in the mind of the

public with persons who beat their breast, tear their hair, and

declaim blood-curdling episodes. A decade or more ago, the drawing-room

reciter was of this type, and was rapidly becoming the bugbear of

social gatherings. The difference between the stilted reciter and

the simple story-teller is perhaps best illustrated by an episode in

Hans C. Andersen's immortal story of the Nightingale.[1] The real

Nightingale and the artificial Nightingale have been bidden by the

Emperor to unite their forces and to sing a duet at a Court function.

The duet turns out most disastrously, and whilst the artificial

Nightingale is singing his one solo for the thirty-third time, the

real Nightingale flies out of the window back to the green wood--a

true artist, instinctively choosing his right atmosphere. But the

bandmaster--symbol of the pompous pedagogue--in trying to soothe

the outraged feelings of the courtiers, says, “Because, you see,

Ladies and Gentlemen, and, above all, Your Imperial Majesty, with the

real nightingale you never can tell what you will hear, but in the

artificial nightingale everything is decided beforehand. So it is, and

so it must remain. It cannot be otherwise.”

And as in the case of the two nightingales, so it is with the stilted

reciter and the simple narrator: one is busy displaying the machinery,

showing “how the tunes go”--the other is anxious to conceal the art.

Simplicity should be the keynote of story-telling, but (and here the

comparison with the Nightingale breaks down) it is a simplicity which

comes after much training in self-control, and much hard work in

overcoming the difficulties which beset the presentation.

I do not mean that there are not born story-tellers who _could_ hold

an audience without preparation, but they are so rare in number that

we can afford to neglect them in our general consideration; for this

work is dedicated to the average story-tellers anxious to make the

best use of their dramatic ability, and it is to them that I present

my plea for special study and preparation before telling a story to a

group of children--that is, if they wish for the far-reaching effects

I shall speak of later on. Only the preparation must be of a much less

stereotyped nature than that by which the ordinary reciters are trained

for their career.

Some years ago, when I was in the States, I was asked to put into

the form of lectures my views upon the educational value of telling

stories. A sudden inspiration seized me. I began to cherish a dream of

long hours to be spent in the British Museum, the Congressional Library

in Washington and the Public Library at Boston--and this is the only

portion of the dream which has been realized. I planned an elaborate

scheme of research work which was to result in a magnificent (if musty)

philological treatise. I thought of trying to discover by long and

patient researches what species of lullaby were crooned by Egyptian

mothers to their babes, and what were the elementary dramatic poems in

vogue among Assyrian nursemaids which were the prototypes of “Little

Jack Horner,” “Dickory, Dickory Dock,” and other nursery classics. I

intended to follow up the study of these ancient documents by making

an appendix of modern variants, showing what progress we had made--if

any--among modern nations.

But there came to me suddenly one day the remembrance of a scene from

Racine's “Plaideurs” in which the counsel for the defence, eager to

show how fundamental is his knowledge, begins his speech:--

“Before the Creation of the World”--And the Judge (with a touch of

weariness tempered by humour) suggests:--

“Let us pass on to the Deluge.”

And thus I, too, have “passed on to the Deluge.” I have abandoned an

account of the origin and past of stories which at the best would

only have displayed a little recently-acquired book-knowledge. When

I thought of the number of scholars who could treat this part of the

question so infinitely better than myself, I realized how much wiser

it would be--though the task is much more humdrum--to deal with the

present possibilities of story-telling for our generation of parents

and teachers, and, leaving out the folk-lore side, devote myself to the

story itself.

My objects in urging the use of stories in the education of children

are at least five-fold:

_First_, to give them dramatic joy, for which they have a natural

craving. _Secondly_, to develop a sense of humour, which is really

a sense of proportion. _Thirdly_, to correct certain tendencies by

showing the consequences in the career of the hero in the story. (Of

this motive the children must be quite unconscious, and there must be

no didactic emphasis.) _Fourthly_, by means of example, not precept,

to present such ideals as will sooner or later (I care not which) be

translated into action. _Fifthly_, to develop the imagination, which

really takes in all the other points.

So much for the purely educational side of the book. But the art of

story-telling, quite apart from the subject, appeals not only to the

educational world or to parents as parents, but also to a wider outside

public, who may be interested in the purely human point of view.

In great contrast to the lofty scheme I had originally proposed to

myself, I now simply place before all those who are interested in

the Art of Story-telling in any form the practical experience I have

had in my travels across the United States and through England; and,

because I am confining myself to personal experience which must of

necessity be limited, I am very anxious not to appear dogmatic or to

give the impression that I wish to lay down the law on the subject. But

I hope my readers may profit by my errors, improve on my methods, and

thus help to bring about the revival of an almost lost art--one which

appeals more directly and more stirringly than any other method to the

majority of listeners.

In Sir Philip Sidney's “Defence of Poesy” we find these words:

“Forsooth he cometh to you with a tale, which holdeth children from

play, and old men from the chimney-corner, and pretending no more,

doth intend the winning of the mind from wickedness to virtue even

as the child is often brought to take most wholesome things by

hiding them in such other as have a pleasant taste.”

MARIE L. SHEDLOCK.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] See p. 138.

CHAPTER I.

THE DIFFICULTIES OF THE STORY.

I PROPOSE to deal in this chapter with the difficulties or dangers

which beset the path of the Story-teller, because, until we have

overcome these, we cannot hope for the finished and artistic

presentation which is to bring out the full value of the story.

The difficulties are many, and yet they ought not to discourage the

would-be narrators, but only show them how all-important is the

preparation for the story, if it is to have the desired effect.

I propose to illustrate by concrete examples, thereby hoping to achieve

a two-fold result: one to fix the subject more clearly in the mind

of the student--the other to use the Art of Story-telling to explain

itself.

I have chosen one or two instances from my own personal experience. The

grave mistakes made in my own case may serve as a warning to others,

who will find, however, that experience is the best teacher. For

positive work, in the long run, we generally find out our own method.

On the negative side, however, it is useful to have certain pitfalls

pointed out to us, in order that we may save time by avoiding them: it

is for this reason that I sound a note of warning. These are:--

I.--_The danger of side issues._ An inexperienced story-teller is

exposed to the temptation of breaking off from the main dramatic

interest in a short exciting story, in order to introduce a side issue,

which is often interesting and helpful, but should be reserved for a

longer and less dramatic story. If the interest turns on some dramatic

moment, the action must be quick and uninterrupted, or it will lose

half its effect.

I had been telling a class of young children the story of Polyphemus

and Ulysses, and, just at the most dramatic moment in it, some impulse

prompted me to go off on a side issue to describe the personal

appearance of Ulysses.

The children were visibly bored, but with polite indifference they

listened to my elaborate description of the hero. If I had given them

an actual description from Homer, I believe that the strength of

the language would have appealed to their imagination (all the more

strongly because they might not have understood the individual words)

and have lessened their disappointment at the dramatic issue being

postponed; but I trusted to my own lame verbal efforts, and signally

failed. Attention flagged, fidgeting began, the atmosphere was rapidly

becoming spoiled, in spite of the patience and toleration still shown

by the children. At last, however, one little girl in the front row, as

spokeswoman for the class, suddenly said: “If you please, before you go

any further, do you mind telling us whether, after all, that Poly ...

(slight pause) that (final attempt) _Polyanthus_ died?”

Now, the remembrance of this question has been of extreme use to me in

my career as a story-teller. I have realized that in a short dramatic

story the mind of the listeners must be set at ease with regard to the

ultimate fate of the special “Polyanthus” who takes the centre of the

stage.

I remember too the despair of a little boy at a dramatic representation

of “Little Red Riding-Hood,” when that little person delayed the

thrilling catastrophe with the Wolf, by singing a pleasant song on her

way through the wood. “Oh, why,” said the little boy, “does she not

get on?” And I quite shared his impatience.

This warning is only necessary in connection with the short dramatic

narrative. There are occasions when we can well afford to offer short

descriptions for the sake of literary style, and for the purpose of

enlarging the vocabulary of the child. I have found, however, in these

cases, it is well to take the children into your confidence--warning

them that they are to expect nothing particularly exciting in the way

of dramatic event: they will then settle down with a freer mind (though

the mood may include a touch of resignation) to the description you are

about to offer them.[2]

II.--_The danger of altering the story to suit special occasions._

This is done sometimes from extreme conscientiousness, sometimes from

sheer ignorance of the ways of children; it is the desire to protect

them from knowledge which they already possess and with which they

(equally conscientious) are apt to “turn and rend” the narrator. I

remember once when I was telling the story of the siege of Troy to

very young children, I suddenly felt anxious lest there should be

anything in the story of the Rape of Helen not altogether suitable for

the average age of the class--namely, nine years. I threw therefore, a

domestic colouring over the whole subject, and presented an imaginary

conversation between Paris and Helen, in which Paris tried to persuade

Helen that she was a strong-minded woman, thrown away on a limited

society in Sparta, and that she should come away and visit some of

the institutions of the world with him, which would doubtless prove

a mutually instructive journey.[3] I then gave the children the view

taken by Herodotus that Helen never went to Troy, but was detained in

Egypt. The children were much thrilled by the story, and responded most

eagerly when, in my inexperience, I invited them to reproduce for the

next day the tale I had just told them.

A small child in the class presented me, as you will see, with the

ethical problem from which I had so laboriously protected _her_. The

essay ran:

“Once upon a time the King of Troy's son was called Paris. And he

went over to _Greace_ to see what it was like. And here he saw the

beautiful Helen_er_, and likewise her husband Menela_yus_. And

one day, Menelayus went out hunting, and left Paris and Helener

alone, and Paris said: ‘Do you not feel _dul_ in this _palis_?’ And

Helener said: ‘I feel very dull in this _pallice_,[4] and Paris

said: 'Come away and see the world with me.’ So they _sliped_ off

together, and they came to the King of Egypt, and _he_ said: ‘Who

_is_ the young lady?’ So Paris told him. ‘But,’ said the King, ‘it

is not _propper_ for you to go off with other people's _wifes_. So

_Helener_ shall stop here.’ Paris stamped his foot. When Menelayus

got home, _he_ stamped his foot. And he called round him all his

soldiers, and they stood round Troy for eleven years. At last they

thought it was no use _standing_ any longer, so they built a wooden

horse in memory of Helener and the Trojans and it was taken into

the town.”

Now the mistake I made in my presentation was to lay particular stress

on the reason for elopement by my careful readjustment, which really

called more attention to the episode than was necessary for the age of

my audience; and evidently caused confusion in the minds of some of the

children who knew the story in its more accurate original form.

Whilst travelling in the States, I was provided with a delightful

appendix to this story. I had been telling Miss Longfellow and her

sister the little girl's version of the Siege of Troy, and Mrs. Thorpe

made the following comment, with the American humour whose dryness adds

so much to its value:

“I never realised before,” she said, “how glad the Greeks must have

been to sit down even inside a horse, when they had been _standing_ for

eleven years.”

III.--_The danger of introducing unfamiliar words._ This is the very

opposite danger of the one to which I have just alluded; it is the

taking for granted that children are acquainted with the meaning of

certain words upon which turns some important point in the story. We

must not introduce (without at least a passing explanation) words

which, if not rightly understood, would entirely alter the picture we

wish to present.

I had once promised to tell stories to an audience of Irish peasants,

and I should like to state here that, though my travels have brought

me into touch with almost every kind of audience, I have never found

one where the atmosphere is so “self-prepared” as in that of a group

of Irish peasants. To speak to them (especially on the subject of

Fairy-tales) is like playing on a delicate harp: the response is so

quick and the sympathy is so keen. Of course the subject of Fairy-tales

is one which is completely familiar to them and comes into their

every-day life. They have a feeling of awe with regard to fairies,

which in some parts of Ireland is very deep.[5]

On this particular occasion I had been warned by an artist friend

who had kindly promised to sing songs between the stories, that my

audience would be of varying age and almost entirely illiterate. Many

of the older men and women, who could neither read nor write, had

never been beyond their native village. I was warned to be very simple

in my language and to explain any difficult words which might occur

in the particular Indian story I had chosen for that night, namely,

“The Tiger, The Jackal and the Brahman.”[6] It happened that the older

portion of the audience had scarcely ever seen even the picture of wild

animals. I profited by the advice, and offered a word of explanation

with regard to the Tiger and the Jackal. I also explained the meaning

of the word Brahman--at a proper distance, however, lest the audience

should class him with wild animals. I then went on with my story, in

the course of which I mentioned the Buffalo. In spite of the warning

I had received, I found it impossible not to believe that the name of

this animal would be familiar to any audience. I therefore went on with

the sentence containing this word, and ended it thus: “And then the

Brahman went a little further and met an old Buffalo turning a wheel.”

The next day, whilst walking down the village street, I entered into

conversation with a thirteen-year-old girl who had been in my audience

the night before, and who began at once to repeat in her own words the

Indian story in question. When she came to the particular sentence I

have just quoted, I was greatly startled to hear _her_ version, which

ran thus: “And the priest went on a little further, and he met another

old gentleman pushing a wheelbarrow.” I stopped her at once, and not

being able to identify the sentence as part of the story I had told, I

questioned her a little more closely. I found that the word Buffalo had

evidently conveyed to her mind an old “_buffer_” whose name was “Lo”

(probably taken to be an Indian form of appellation, to be treated with

tolerance though it might not be Irish in sound). Then, not knowing of

any wheel more familiarly than that attached to a barrow, the young

narrator completed the picture in her own mind--which, doubtless, was a

vivid one--but one must admit that it had lost something of the Indian

atmosphere which I had intended to gather about it.

IV.--_The danger of claiming the co-operation of the class by means of

questions._ The danger in this case is more serious for the teacher

than the child, who rather enjoys the process and displays a fatal

readiness to give any sort of answer if only he can play a part in the

conversation. If we could depend on the children giving the kind of

answer we expect, all might go well, and the danger would be lessened;

but children have a perpetual way of frustrating our hopes in this

direction, and of landing us in unexpected bypaths from which it is not

always easy to return to the main road without a very violent reaction.

As illustrative of this, I quote from “The Madness of Philip,” by

Josephine Dodge Daskam Bacon, a truly delightful essay on Child

Psychology, in the guise of the lightest of stories.

The scene takes place in a Kindergarten--where a bold and fearless

visitor has undertaken to tell a story on the spur of the moment to a

group of restless children.

She opens thus: “Yesterday, children, as I came out of my yard, what do

you think I saw?”

The elaborately concealed surprise in store was so obvious that

Marantha rose to the occasion and suggested “an el'phunt.”

“Why, no. Why should I see an elephant in my yard? It was not _nearly_

so big as that--it was a little thing.”

“A fish,” ventured Eddy Brown, whose eye fell upon the aquarium in the

corner. The raconteuse smiled patiently.

“Now, how could a fish, a live fish, get into my front yard?”

“A dead fish,” says Eddy. He had never been known to relinquish

voluntarily an idea.

“No; it was a little kitten,” said the story-teller decidedly. “A

little white kitten. She was standing right near a big puddle of water.

Now, what else do you think I saw?”

“Another kitten,” suggests Marantha, conservatively.

“No; it was a big Newfoundland dog. He saw the little kitten near the

water. Now, cats don't like water, do they? What do they like?”

“Mice,” said Joseph Zukoffsky abruptly.

“Well, yes, they do; but there were no mice in my yard. I'm sure you

know what I mean. If they don't like _water_, _what_ do they like?”

“Milk,” cried Sarah Fuller confidently.

“They like a dry place,” said Mrs. R. B. Smith. “Now, what do you

suppose the dog did?”

It may be that successive failures had disheartened the listeners. It

may be that the very range of choice presented to them and the dog

alike dazzled their imagination. At all events, they made no answer.

“Nobody knows what the dog did?” repeated the story-teller

encouragingly. “What would you do if you saw a little kitten like that?”

And Philip remarked gloomily:

“I'd pull its tail.”

“And what do the rest of you think? I hope you are not as cruel as that

little boy.”

A jealous desire to share Philip's success prompted the quick response:

“I'd pull it too.”

Now, the reason of the total failure of this story was the inability

to draw any real response from the children, partly because of the

hopeless vagueness of the questions, partly because, there being no

time for reflection, the children said the first thing that comes into

their head without any reference to their real thoughts on the subject.

I cannot imagine anything less like the enlightened methods of the best

Kindergarten teaching. Had Mrs. R. B. Smith been a real, and not a

fictional, person, it would certainly have been her last appearance as

a _raconteuse_ in this educational institution.

V.--_The difficulty of gauging the effect of a story upon the

audience._ This rises from lack of observation and experience; it

is the want of these qualities which leads to the adoption of such

a method as I have just presented. We learn in time that want of

expression on the faces of the audience and want of any kind of

external response does not always mean either lack of interest or

attention. There is often real interest deep down, but no power, or

perhaps no wish, to display that interest, which is deliberately

concealed at times so as to protect oneself from questions which may be

put.

I was speaking on one occasion in Davenport in the State of Iowa. I had

been engaged to deliver a lecture to adults on the “Fun and Philosophy”

of Hans C. Andersen's Fairy Tales. When I arrived at the Hall, I was

surprised and somewhat annoyed to find four small boys sitting in

the front row. They seemed to be about ten years old, and, knowing

pretty well from experience what boys of that age usually like, I felt

rather anxious as to what would happen, and I must confess that for

once I wished children had the useful faculty, developed in adults,

of successfully concealing their feelings. Any hopes I had conceived

on this point were speedily shattered. After listening to the first

few sentences, two of the boys evidently recognised the futility of

bestowing any further attention on the subject, and consoled themselves

for the dulness of the occasion by starting a “scrap.” I watched this

proceeding for a minute with great interest, but soon recalled the

fact that I had not been engaged in the capacity of spectator, so,

addressing the antagonists in as severe a manner as I could assume, I

said: “Boys, I shall have to ask you to go to the back of the hall.”

They responded with much alacrity, and evident gratitude, and even

exceeded my instructions by leaving the hall altogether.

My sympathy was now transferred to the two remaining boys, who sat

motionless, and one of them never took his eyes off me during the whole

lecture. I feared lest they might be simply cowed by the treatment

meted out to their companions, whose joy in their release had been

somewhat tempered by the disgrace of ejection. I felt sorry that I

could not provide these model boys with a less ignominious retreat,

and I cast about in my mind how I could make it up to them. At the end

of the lecture, I addressed them personally and, congratulating them

on their quiet behaviour, said that, as I feared the main part of the

lecture could scarcely have interested them, I should conclude, not

with the story I had intended for the adults, but with a special story

for them, as a reward for their good behaviour. I then told Hans C.

Andersen's “Jack the Dullard,” which I have always found to be a great

favourite with boys. These particular youths smiled very faintly, and

left any expression of enthusiasm to the adult portion of the audience.

My hostess, who was eager to know what the boys thought, enquired of

them how they liked the lecture. The elder one said guardedly: “I liked

it very well, but I was _piqued_ at her underrating my appreciation of

Hans Andersen.”

I was struck with the entirely erroneous impression I had received of

the effect I was producing upon the boys. I was thankful at least that

a passing allusion to Schopenhauer in my lecture possibly provided some

interest for this “young old” child.

I felt somewhat in the position of a Doctor of Divinity in Canada to

whom a small child confided the fact that she had written a parody on

“The Three Fishers,” but that it had dropped into the fire. The Doctor

made some facetious rejoinder about the impertinence of the flames in

consuming her manuscript. The child reproved him in these grave words:

“Nature, you know, _is_ Nature, and her laws are inviolable.”

VI.--_The danger of over illustration._ After long experience, and

after considering the effect produced on children when pictures are

shown to them during the narration, I have come to the conclusion

that the appeal to the eye and the ear at the same time is of

doubtful value, and has, generally speaking, a distracting effect;

the concentration on one channel of communication attracts and holds

the attention more completely. I was confirmed in this theory when I

addressed an audience of blind people for the first time, and noticed

how closely they attended, and how much easier it seemed to them,

because they were so completely “undistracted by the sights around

them.”[7]

I have often suggested to young teachers two experiments in support

of this theory. They are not practical experiments, nor could they

be repeated often with the same audience, but they are intensely

interesting and they serve to show the _actual_ effect of appealing to

one sense at a time. The first of these experiments is to take a small

group of children and suggest that they should close their eyes whilst

you tell them a story. You will then notice how much more attention

is given to the intonation and inflection of the voice. The reason

is obvious: because there is nothing to distract the attention, it

is concentrated on the only thing offered to the listeners (that is,

sound), to enable them to seize the dramatic interest of the story.

We find an example of the dramatic power of the voice in its appeal

to the imagination, in one of the tributes brought by an old pupil to

Thomas Edward Brown (Master at Clifton College):

“My earliest recollection is that his was the most vivid teaching I

ever received: great width of view and poetical, almost passionate,

power of presentment. We were reading Froude's History, and I shall

never forget how it was Brown's words, Brown's voice, not the

historian's, that made me feel the great democratic function which

the monasteries performed in England: the view became alive in his

mouth.”

And in another passage:

“All set forth with such dramatic force and aided by such a

splendid voice, left an indelible impression on my mind.” (_Letters

of T. E. Brown_, p. 55.)

A second experiment, and a much more subtle and difficult one, is to

take the same group of children on another occasion, telling them a

story in pantomime form, giving them first the briefest outline of

it. In this case this must be of the simplest construction, until

the children are able (if you continue the experiment) to look for

something more subtle.

I have never forgotten the marvellous performance of a play given

in London, many years ago, entirely in pantomime form. The play was

called _L'Enfant Prodigue_, and was presented by a company of French

artists. It would be almost impossible to exaggerate the strength of

that “silent appeal” to the public. One was so unaccustomed to reading

meaning and development of character into gesture and facial expression

that it was really a revelation to most present--certainly to all

Anglo-Saxons.

I cannot touch on this subject without admitting the enormous dramatic

value connected with the kinematograph. Though it can never take

the place of an actual performance, whether in story form or on

the stage, it has a real educational value in its possibilities of

representation which it is difficult to over-estimate, and I believe

that its introduction into the school curriculum, under the strictest

supervision, will be of extraordinary benefit. The movement, in its

present chaotic condition, and in the hands of a commercial management,

is more likely to stifle than to awaken or stimulate the imagination,

but the educational world is fully alive to the danger, and I am

convinced that in the future of the movement good will predominate.

The real value of the cinematograph in connection with stories is that

it provides the background that is wanting to the inner vision of the

average child, and does not prevent its imagination from filling in

the details later. For instance, it would be quite impossible for the

average child to get an idea from mere word-painting of the atmosphere

of the Polar regions, as represented lately on the film in connection

with Captain Scott's expedition; but any stories told later on about

these regions would have an infinitely greater interest.

There is, however, a real danger in using pictures to illustrate the

story--especially if it be one which contains a direct appeal to the

imagination of the child (as quite distinct from the stories which deal

with facts)--which is that you force the whole audience of children

to see the same picture, instead of giving each individual child the

chance of making his own mental picture, which is of far greater joy,

and of much greater educational value, since by this process the child

co-operates with you instead of having all the work done for it.

Queyrat, in his work on “La Logique chez l'Enfant” quotes Madame

Necker de Saussure:[8] “To children and animals actual objects present

themselves, not the terms of their manifestations. For them thinking

is seeing over again, it is going through the sensations that the real

object would have produced. Everything which goes on within them is

in the form of pictures, or rather, inanimate scenes in which Life is

partially reproduced.... Since the child has, as yet, no capacity for

abstraction, he finds a stimulating power in words and a suggestive

inspiration which holds him enchanted. They awaken vividly-coloured

images, pictures far more brilliant than would be called into being by

the objects themselves.”

Surely, if this be true, we are taking from children that rare power of

mental visualisation by offering to their outward vision an _actual_

picture.

I was struck with the following note by a critic of the “Outlook,”

referring to a Japanese play but bearing directly on the subject in

hand.

“First, we should be inclined to put insistence upon appeal by

_imagination_. Nothing is built up by lath and canvas; everything has

to be created by the poet's speech.”

He alludes to the decoration of one of the scenes, which consists

of three pines, showing what can be conjured up in the mind of the

spectator.

Ah, yes. Unfolding now before my eyes

The views I know: the Forest, River, Sea

And Mist--the scenes of Ono now expand.

I have often heard objections raised to this theory by teachers dealing

with children whose knowledge of objects outside their own little

limited circle is so scanty that words we use without a suspicion that

they are unfamiliar are really foreign expressions to them. Such words

as sea, woods, fields, mountains would mean nothing to them, unless

some explanation were offered. To these objections I have replied that

where we are dealing with objects that can actually be seen with the

bodily eyes, then it is quite legitimate to show pictures of those

objects before you begin the story, so that the distraction between the

actual and mental presentation may not cause confusion; but, as the

foregoing example shows, we should endeavour to accustom the children

to seeing much more than the mere objects themselves, and in dealing

with abstract qualities we must rely solely on the power and choice of

words and dramatic qualities of presentation, nor need we feel anxious

if the response is not immediate, or even if it is not quick and

eager.[9]

VII.--_The danger of obscuring the point of the story with too many

details._ This is not peculiar to teachers, nor is it only shown in

the narrative form. I have often heard really brilliant after-dinner

stories marred by this defect. One remembers the attempt made by Sancho

Panza to tell a story to Don Quixote, and I have always felt a keen

sympathy with the latter in his impatience over the recital.

“‘In a village of Estramadura there was a shepherd--no, I mean

a goatherd--which shepherd--or goatherd--as my story says, was

called Lope Ruiz--and this Lope Ruiz was in love with a shepherdess

called Torralva, who was daughter to a rich herdsman, and this rich

herdsman----’

‘If this be thy story, Sancho,’ said Don Quixote, ‘thou wilt not

have done these two days. Tell it concisely like a man of sense, or

else say no more.’

‘I tell it in the manner they tell all stories in my country,’

answered Sancho, ‘and I cannot tell it otherwise, nor ought your

Worship to require me to make new customs.’

‘Tell it as thou wilt, then,’ said Don Quixote; ‘since it is the

will of fate that I should hear it, go on.’

Sancho continued:

‘He looked about him until he espied a fisherman with a boat

near him, but so small that it could only hold one person and

one goat. The fisherman got into the boat and carried over one

goat; he returned and carried another; he came back again and

carried another. Pray, sir, keep an account of the goats which the

fisherman is carrying over, for if you lose count of a single one,

the story ends, and it will be impossible to tell a word more....

I go on, then.... He returned for another goat, and another, and

another and another----’

‘_Suppose_ them all carried over,’ said Don Quixote, ‘or thou wilt

not have finished carrying them this twelve months.’

‘Tell me, how many have passed already?’ said Sancho.

‘How should I know?’ answered Don Quixote.

‘See there, now! Did I not tell thee to keep an exact account?

There is an end of the story. I can go no further.’

‘How can this be?’ said Don Quixote. ‘Is it so essential to the

story to know the exact number of goats that passed over, that if

one error be made the story can proceed no further?’

‘Even so,’ said Sancho Panza.”

VIII.--_The danger of over-explanation._ Again, another danger lurks in

the temptation to offer over much explanation of the story, which is

common to most story-tellers. This is fatal to the artistic success of

any story, but it is even more serious in connection with stories told

from an educational point of view, because it hampers the imagination

of the listener; and since the development of that faculty is one of

our chief aims in telling these stories, we must let it have free play,

nor must we test the effect, as I have said before, by the material

method of asking questions. My own experience is that the fewer

explanations you offer (provided you have been careful with the choice

of your material and artistic in the presentation) the more readily the

child will supplement by his own thinking power what is necessary for

the understanding of the story.

Queyrat says: “A child has no need of seizing on the exact meaning of

words; on the contrary, a certain lack of precision seems to stimulate

his imagination only the more vigorously, since it gives it a broader

liberty and firmer independence.”[10]

IX.--One special danger lies in the _lowering of the standard of the

story_ in order to cater to the undeveloped taste of the child. I am

alluding here only to the story which is presented from the educational

point of view. There are moments of relaxation in a child's life, as in

that of an adult, when a lighter taste can be gratified. I am alluding

now to the standard of story for school purposes.

There is one development of the subject which seems to have been very

little considered either in the United States or in our own country,

namely, the telling of stories to _old_ people, and that not only in

institutions or in quiet country villages, but in the heart of the

busy cities and in the homes of these old people. How often, when the

young people are able to enjoy outside amusements, the old people,

necessarily confined to the chimney-corner and many unable to read

much for themselves, might return to the joy of their childhood by

hearing some of the old stories told them in dramatic form. Here is

a delightful occupation for those of the leisured class who have the

gift, and a much more effective way of capturing attention than the