Awritingreader’s Weblog

I wanted to return to Benjamin again after re-reading my previous post and realizing that perhaps it sounded a bit harsh. In actuality, although I may not agree with some of the conclusions he draws or even the ways in which he draws them, I find much of Benjamin’s essay intriguing and thought provoking. I read over section nine again today during class and was struck by how I missed the obvious parallel between the storyteller and the actor. Benjamin’s fear is that as craftsmanship dies out, so will storytelling and with that goes an invaluable tradition.

It was Benjamin’s repetitious use of the word “craft” that first caught my attention. In acting, or in the theatre in general, we always talk about our craft: that thing we work on, cultivate, try to perfect, and then give to our audience. As with most skills, actors study under the supervision of a superior. Behind the craft is the element of apprenticeship and intentionality, in this way (slightly akin to Eliot’s concept of tradition) the craft repeats something without being repetitious. The same soul found behind Benjamin’s storytelling still thrives in the world of theatre. Even within the very form that the two methods take, we can find striking similarities. The actor, like the storyteller, has sole command over the tale being told. The audience, like the listeners, attentively take in the words being spoken. They remember the stories from theatre because like those of storytelling, they engage the listeners and allow the audience to forget itself in place of absorbing what is being offered. At its very best, a work of theatre collaborates not only with fellow actors, directors, and workers to increase wisdom and understanding, but it also emits the story artfully, and if done well, with counsel and experience successfully transmitted to the audience. These characteristics fall directly in line with Benjamin’s notion of storytellers and storytelling. Though perhaps not a perfect overlay comparison, it may be said that while the days of appreciating the craft of storytelling by sitting around a fire and listening to the wise performer might be gone and undervalued, the same basic notions and principals are transmitted through the craft of theatre by sitting around a convex stage and listening to a rehearsed and practiced actor reciting the lines of a fine and wise scribe who perhaps captures the wisdom and knowledge of the storyteller through a script.