“Behold the hands…
…how they promise, conjure, appeal, menace, pray, supplicate, refuse, beckon, interrogate, admire, confess, cringe, instruct, command, mock and what not besides, with a variation and multiplication of variation which makes the tongue envious.”
― Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592)
You know that your hands are magnificent: from constructing meals or buildings or clothes or machines or manuscripts, to creating art and gardens and hairbraids and websites and, well…’most everything you do!
In storytelling, your hands are a powerful part of your “toolkit”
- Whether it’s pantomiming picking that apple off of that tree or other actions in the plot,
- or shading your eyes in the sharp sun of the story’s setting,
- or extending gestures that flow from the emotion of your story’s character (or your own!),
- …your hands can be an eloquent instrument of connection with your audience, as well as with your story.
“The actor (storyteller) should be able to create the universe in the palm of his(/her) hand.” – Laurence Olivier [Even though I had to adapt it a bit, I had to use this quote…it’s perfect for the storyteller!]
There are different practices, even different schools of thought regarding your hands’ gestures:
- Do you plan and intentionally create specific, effective movements, a kind of choreographing of your story?
- Or do you follow a more “organic” flow of immersing yourself in the events, characters and emotions of the story and just “let gestures happen?”
You may be drawn to one of these paths over the other; both can be effective. (This is an aspect of preparing your stories that can benefit from working with a coach or a rehearsal partner.)
Develop your comfort and confidence with using your hands in storytelling
Novice or nervous storytellers often don’t know what to do with their hands. Do you do any of these? –
- clasp hands behind your back
- clasp hands in front of you
- shove your hands in your pockets
- grasp a lectern or other available piece of furniture
- hang them woodenly at your sides
- feel like you “don’t know what to do with” your hands?!!
1) Immersing yourself in the imagery of your story, 2) making sure you breathe fully (see my previous post on “Breathe!”), 3) being sure to stretch and eat well and take care of your body (which is, after all, your storytelling instrument!) – all of this will contribute to enabling you to deeply connect with both your story and your listeners. And THIS will increase your comfort and ability to engage your magnificent hands in your storytelling!
“Often the hands will solve a mystery that the intellect has struggled with in vain.” – Carl Jung
——–
In this beautiful early April, I leave you with this poem by e.e. cummings – because storytellers do indeed use our hands to “arrange and place carefully there a strange thing and a known thing here” as we share our stories with listeners:
Spring is like a perhaps hand
by e. e. cummings
Spring is like a perhaps hand
(which comes carefully
out of Nowhere)arranging
a window,into which people look(while
people stare
arranging and changing placing
carefully there a strange
thing and a known thing here)and
changing everything carefully
spring is like a perhaps
Hand in a window
(carefully to
and fro moving New and
Old things,while
people stare carefully
moving a perhaps
fraction of flower here placing
an inch of air there)and
without breaking anything.
===
And here’s the poem “A Hand” by Jane Hirshfield
Thanks for reading – Pam
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