The Future of Story

Pretty funny the way that Paul Bellini explains so colorfully that story telling is dead. In his article “The Death of Story Telling” he explains that, “We don’t go to the movies to see stories anymore. We go to watch shit blow up. And all we leave the theatre with is shit. Is storytelling dead? Bellini goes on to give ten reasons as to why story telling is dying if not dead. His argument is that the plots of movies in particular are mostly generic. You have a super hero that will in the end defeat the villain. He uses the examples that ghosts are able to move things and can be seen by those that are living. “What is more finite than death?” Bellini believes that television networks are to blame for the downfall of story telling. Gottschall on the other hand has a much grander view and much more optimistic view of the future of story telling. Gottschall sees poetry in the genres of the music that is most popular in today’s societies. Rap and R&B give poetry a new image, an image that is cool, hip, and cutting edge. “Ours is not the age when poetry died; it is the age when poetry triumphed in the form of song.” Gottschall also uses the example of WoW, Call of Duty, and Modern Warfare 3 to explain that story is alive and well in todays youth. It is my opinion that you can take the side of ether of these two men. It would depend on how you define story telling; if you look at the play writes such as Shakespeare, it is my opinion that his brilliance has not been matched, but also that brilliance has not been lost. Take the mind of Spielberg and others who have brought us Star Wars and Avatar. It is my opinion that these are great stories told by brilliant minds. http://gutterbird.com/secrets/?p=1134