Long time no blog. For now, here is a longish story I wrote for The National on oral storytelling traditions in India. I had great fun researching for and writing this story.
To watch Jeeva Raghunath tell a story is a bit like being transported back to one’s childhood; those days of innocence when you were ready to believe in a world of magic where gods lived, birds spoke and the good always won in the end.
Raghunath waves her hand, stamps her foot, rolls her eyes, raises her voice, all just so. And her audience is enthralled: as she flaps her hands and crows “Caw, caw”, the little ones faithfully repeat “Caw, caw” after her.
I particularly like what Devdutt Patnaik said, “Take away stories and you take away culture. Stories are also a medium to communicate ideas and to resolve conflicts in society. They tell us how to see the world. If there were no stories we would not have concepts like good/bad, right/wrong, heaven/hell, god/demon. Stories are how we imagine the reality around us.”