Bhubaneswar: The history of storytelling is as ancient as the beginnings of human existence on earth. Storytelling is believed to have existed much before recorded history. But it has changed form from the time humans told stories through cave paintings to novels and movies, and the oral tradition had all but vanished today.
It is into this milieu that Bhufesto — the Bhubaneswar Fetsival of Storytelling (BHUFESTO) — has been launched as an attempt to revive the art. The IG Park, Kharabela Park and Buddha Park here came under the spell of stories told by verbal and visual means Thursday, and more stories will be told till the inaugural initiative concludes December 9.
Storytellers from India and other countries such as France, Kenya and Argentina are at the festival. More than 600 children from schools across the capital, including Mother’s Public School, DAV Public school Unit 8, Government Boys’ and Girls’ High School Unit I and BBC School for the Deaf formed the lion’s share of the audience.
At IG park, storyteller Deepa Kiran told stories with the help of Nita Gopalakrishnan, the Indian sign language specialist and story teller; they told the story ‘The Cap Seller and The Monkeys’.
While the story originally has a group of monkeys taking away the merchandise of a cap seller while he sleeps under a tree and the cap seller later manipulating the monkeys to imitate him in throwing away the caps, thus retrieving the caps, Deepa tweaked the climax.
In her new-age story, the monkeys are proportionally smarter and refuse to be tricked by the cap seller. The way Deepa told the story all the more interesting for the kids.
Deepa is among storytellers of renown from the subcontinent and was the first Indian to be invited to the Kanoon International Storytelling Festival held in Iran. The Hyderabad-based mother of two boys is multilingual, too; she speaks Tamil, her mother tongue, Hindi, Telugu, English, Malayalam, Bengali, Marathi, Punjabi and Kannada.
“The style of storytelling has changed greatly, the methods have changed; but the desire to tell and hear stories has remained unchanged. Storytelling has the power to impact people deeply. We need more storytellers, and we must get to listen to more beautiful stories,” Deepa says. “Earlier, when I used to tell people that I am a storyteller, they used to come back asking what I actually did for a living. So awareness was required and it still is,” she adds about how her profession is perceived.
After Deepa Sabrina Arasum from France presented the puppet show ‘Raymond’ in which an old Frenchman visits India and admires the beauty of the country and shows the magic tricks to children. He managed to produce riotous laughter among children. Raymond’s interesting characterisation and witty dialogue managed to tickle the funny bones of the young and the old alike. The kids in particular were in splits whenever Raymond came to them and say the world “blah blah”.
She said India and France had a strong history in puppet shows and that the festival would strengthen that relation.
Bhupendra Singh Poonia state project director OPEPA said that this was the first such exposure for many children in the audience. He said oral tradition is ancient although not quite relevant to the current times. “Through this festival, we are trying to revive that style again,” he said.
Sujit Mohapatra of Bakul Foundation said storytelling festivals need to happen more often in the city and that Bhufesto was the first step towards that.
