How to Tell Stories to Children, And Some Stories to Tell | Page 2

Why the
Morning-Glory climbs The Story of Little Tavwots The Pig Brother
The Cake The Pied Piper of Hamelin Town Why the Evergreen Trees
keep their Leaves in Winter The Star Dollars The Lion and the Gnat
ESPECIALLY FOR CLASSES II. AND III.
The Cat and the Parrot The Rat Princess The Frog and the Ox The
Fire-Bringer The Burning of the Ricefields The Story of Wylie Little
Daylight The Sailor Man The Story of Jairus's Daughter
ESPECIALLY FOR CLASSES IV. AND V.
Arthur and the Sword Tarpeia The Buckwheat The Judgment of Midas
Why the Sea is salt Billy Beg and his Ball The Little Hero of Haarlem
The Last Lesson The Story of Christmas
THE CHILD-MIND; AND HOW TO SATISFY IT
A short List of Books in which the Story-teller will find Stories not too
far from the Form in which they are needed.

INTRODUCTION
Not long ago, I chanced to open a magazine at a story of Italian life
which dealt with a curious popular custom. It told of the love of the
people for the performances of a strangely clad, periodically appearing
old man who was a professional story-teller. This old man repeated
whole cycles of myth and serials of popular history, holding his

audience-chamber in whatever corner of the open court or square he
happened upon, and always surrounded by an eager crowd of listeners.
So great was the respect in which the story-teller was held, that any
interruption was likely to be resented with violence.
As I read of the absorbed silence and the changing expressions of the
crowd about the old man, I was suddenly reminded of a company of
people I had recently seen. They were gathered in one of the parlours of
a women's college, and their serious young faces had, habitually, none
of the childlike responsiveness of the Italian populace; they were
suggestive, rather, of a daily experience which precluded over-much
surprise or curiosity about anything.
In the midst of the group stood a frail-looking woman with bright eyes.
She was telling a story, a children's story, about a good and a bad little
mouse.
She had been asked to do that thing, for a purpose, and she did it,
therefore. But it was easy to see from the expressions of the listeners
how trivial a thing it seemed to them.
That was at first. But presently the room grew quieter, and yet quieter.
The faces relaxed into amused smiles, sobered in unconscious
sympathy, finally broke in ripples of mirth. The story-teller had come
to her own.
The memory of the college girls listening to the mouse-story brought
other memories with it. Many a swift composite view of faces passed
before my mental vision, faces with the child's look on them, yet not
the faces of children. And of the occasions to which the faces belonged,
those were most vivid which were earliest in my experience. For it was
those early experiences which first made me realise the modern
possibilities of the old, old art of telling stories.
It had become a part of my work, some years ago, to give English
lectures on German literature. Many of the members of my class were
unable to read in the original the works with which I dealt, and as these
were modern works, it was rarely possible to obtain translations.
For this reason, I gradually formed the habit of telling the story of the
drama or novel in question before passing to a detailed consideration of
it. I enjoyed this part of the lesson exceedingly, but it was some time
before I realised how much the larger part of the lesson it had become
to the class. They used--and they were mature women--to wait for the

story as if it were a sugarplum and they, children; and to grieve openly
if it were omitted. Substitution of reading from a translation was
greeted with precisely the same abatement of eagerness that a child
shows when he has asked you to tell a story, and you offer, instead, to
"read one from the pretty book." And so general and constant were the
tokens of enjoyment that there could ultimately be no doubt of the
power which the mere story-telling exerted.
The attitude of the grown-up listeners did but illustrate the general
difference between the effect of telling a story and of reading one.
Everyone who knows children well has felt the difference. With few
exceptions, children listen twice as eagerly to a story told as to one read,
and even a "recitation" or a so-called "reading" has not the charm for
them that the person wields who can "tell a story." And there are sound
reasons for their preference.
The great difference, including lesser ones, between telling and reading
is that the teller is