Driving with the kid one day, I heard the Schererazade Symphony on the radio. The story about the “never ending story” where the heroine saves her life by telling a story that never actually ends over 1001 nights. Naturally I tried it with my daughter.
I told her a story of a hero, who needs to get a pearl out of an oyster, but then has to save a ghost from a lighthouse, but then has to save a troll from a wishing well, and on and on. The Hero’s name was just “hero.” Everytime the hero tries to solve a quest, another quest starts. Everyone keeps asking him for help and favors, and he just keeps going.
I would tell the hero story on walks to school. If we drove, then no story. I think it took me 14 months to tell the full story before I finally ended it, with a cliff-hanger of course.
The story that never ends was a great lesson on life:
- It started off the day with creativity. (Another rudder of the day idea) Every time I had to make up characters and new story lines on the spot. Every day I told the story that never ends, the day just seemed to go better. My own writing was better. A verbal morning journal.
- You wanted to advance the story, but not go too far, and still end by the time we got to school – 20 minutes. You also had to track all of the moving layers: it worked both of our memories.
- It encouraged us to walk, no walk – no story.
- It allowed me to take bits and pieces from other stories and history, to think and connect for new material, to constantly come up with new plotlines and new characters and names. Merlin had a brother named Swerlin, who has a cousin named Sven.
- There was no pressure to get everything right, it never ended.
- My daughter loved every minute of it.
We just started on volume 2 on Friday. Not suprisingly Friday was a great day full of great big ideas, and great conversations. The hero got pulled away from his wedding day by Swerlin.
Poor guy, he never seems to catch a break.
Simpletition - Shawn D. Madden 