Hobbits, Ham, and Human Drama: the Blessing of Storytelling

I’ve been listening to Andy Serkis’s #Hobbitathon, a live stream charity reading of the The Hobbit https://www.gofundme.com/f/thehobbitathoncovid19appeal. He’s spontaneously inventing accents and voices and song tunes. It’s unrehearsed and unedited, with the actor stumbling over sentences and sometimes losing his place. It’s no audiobook but it’s glorious.

There’s something so magical about having a story read to you, isn’t there?

I think back to primary school, sat on the floor in the corner of the classroom for Little Grey Rabbit or Charlie and The Great Glass Elevator - favourites for both children and teachers.

How I loved to read to my own children. I can still quote the rhyming books – Hairy McClary, My Cat Likes to Hide in Boxes, and of course Dr Seuss. Visiting Seuss Landing at Universal’s Islands of Adventure, my boys were unimpressed by the novelty of a green eggs and ham roll as they were so used to ours! I look back and wonder if these books seeded my younger son’s talent for song writing.

The Harry Potter saga were the final bedtime stories I read to my older son. He admitted afterwards that he had been secretly reading ahead on his own but didn’t want to spoil the shared experience.

Storytelling does that: builds bonds between teller and listeners.

I think of the stories I have read to my Boys’ Brigade lads: learning to read fluently upside down so they could see the illustrations of The Jesse Tree; energetic games of the repetitious Story Gym; their immediate engagement with The Pilgrim’s Progress, a theme for other activities.

Perhaps storytelling is more meaningful when it’s personal to the teller and that comes over to the reader? Who better than Serkis to read Tolkien’s tale?

One of my bugbears about church services is Bible readings. Emphasis has rightly been put on clarity of words and diction but so often, sadly, at the expense of meaning and drama. It’s as if we feel these words are so holy that we forget these are stories we’re sharing, or personal letters, or poetry. At its worst, it’s like a schoolchild being forced to read Shakespeare for the first time with no understanding.

But at its best, we remember that this is God writing to and for us. It is personal.

We remember that these were real people with real human feelings and behaviours: devious David, depressed Elijah, faithful Ruth, knock-kneed Gideon. We hear the paternal call of Paul for the churches to mature in their faith. We share the heart-deep despair and jubilation of the Psalmist.

During lockdown, I’m not one of those people with extra time to develop new or existing skills. I’m working exhausting hours for my hospice patients, struggling to find the energy (let alone the time) to write. But I remind myself that we can all spend time reading and listening and maybe even practising out own story telling skills.

And our Great Storyteller will keep writing and editing His tale in us.

Liz Manning fits writing around being an Occupational Therapist, BB captain, wife, and mum to two adult sons. Or perhaps it's the other way round. She blogs regularly at https://thestufflifeismadeofblog.wordpress.com/