Stories to Tell to Children | Page 4

not mean license to dawdle. Nothing is much more annoying in a
speaker than too great deliberateness, or than hesitation of speech. But
it means a quiet realization of the fact that the floor is yours, everybody
wants to hear you, there is time enough for every point and shade of
meaning and no one will think the story too long. This mental attitude
must underlie proper control of speed. Never hurry. A business-like
leisure is the true attitude of the storyteller.
And the result is best attained by concentrating one's attention on the
episodes of the story. Pass lightly, and comparatively swiftly, over the
portions between actual episodes, but take all the time you need for the
elaboration of those. And above all, do not FEEL hurried.
The next suggestion is eminently plain and practical, if not an all too
obvious one. It is this: if all your preparation and confidence fails you
at the crucial moment, and memory plays the part of traitor in some
particular, if, in short, you blunder on a detail of the story, NEVER
ADMIT IT. If it was an unimportant detail which you misstated, pass
right on, accepting whatever you said, and continuing with it; if you
have been so unfortunate as to omit a fact which was a necessary link
in the chain, put it in, later, as skillfully as you can, and with as
deceptive an appearance of its being in the intended order; but never
take the children behind the scenes, and let them hear the creaking of
your mental machinery. You must be infallible. You must be in the
secret of the mystery, and admit your audience on somewhat unequal
terms; they should have no creeping doubts as to your complete
initiation into the secrets of the happenings you relate.
Plainly, there can be lapses of memory so complete, so all-embracing,
that frank failure is the only outcome, but these are so few as not to
need consideration, when dealing with so simple material as that of
children's stories. There are times, too, before an adult audience, when

a speaker can afford to let his hearers be amused with him over a
chance mistake. But with children it is most unwise to break the spell
of the entertainment in that way. Consider, in the matter of a detail of
action or description, how absolutely unimportant the mere accuracy is,
compared with the effect of smoothness and the enjoyment of the
hearers. They will not remember the detail, for good or evil, half so
long as they will remember the fact that you did not know it. So, for
their sakes, as well as for the success of your story, cover your slips of
memory, and let them be as if they were not.
And now I come to two points in method which have to do especially
with humorous stories. The first is the power of initiating the
appreciation of the joke. Every natural humorist does this by instinct
and the value of the power to story-teller can hardly be overestimated.
To initiate appreciation does not mean that one necessarily gives way
to mirth, though even that is sometimes natural and effective; one
merely feels the approach of the humorous climax, and subtly suggests
to the hearers that it will soon be "time to laugh." The suggestion
usually comes in the form of facial expression, and in the tone. And
children are so much simpler, and so much more accustomed to
following another's lead than their elders, that the expression can be
much more outright and unguarded than would be permissible with a
mature audience.
Children like to feel the joke coming, in this way; they love the
anticipation of a laugh, and they will begin to dimple, often, at your
first unconscious suggestion of humor. If it is lacking, they are
sometimes afraid to follow their own instincts. Especially when you are
facing an audience of grown people and children together, you will find
that the latter are very hesitant about initiating their own expression of
humor. It is more difficult to make them forget their surroundings then,
and more desirable to give them a happy lead. Often at the funniest
point you will see some small listener in an agony of endeavor to cloak
the mirth which he--poor mite-- fears to be indecorous. Let him see that
it is "the thing" to laugh, and that everybody is going to.
Having so stimulated the appreciation of the humorous climax, it is
important to give your hearers time for the full savor of the jest to
permeate their consciousness. It is really robbing an audience of its
rights, to pass so quickly from one point to another that the mind must

lose a new one if it lingers to take in