BEGINNERS
SET IN STONE AGE
Since time immemorial it’s been essential to keep stories exciting, says Adrian Magson
Adrian Magson
Y
ou’re a writer, a storyteller, a spinner of tales, a painter of dreams; capable of drawing readers out of their everyday and into your world – or, at least, the one you’ve created.
It sounds almost noble, even un peu pretentious. But at heart, it’s what storytelling has always been about, ever since the first humans capable of forming words got their kids around the fire and told them what they’d been doing that day. For some these activities would have been repetitive, mainly for survival; foraging, planting crops, skinning game, avoiding enemies or simply making a big round disc-shaped thing and putting legs on it to make a coffee table.
(Rumour has it that the family on the other side copied what they were doing but drilled a hole in the middle, thereby creating the first wheel. The table family missed out on all the credit which followed, but that’s the nature of invention; if you create something, it’s no good keeping it to yourself. The same applies to your writing).