Tales with social twists

His repertoire of stories is as ceaseless as the waves. VISA RAVINDRAN writes about the storyteller at Fishermen's Cove who spins tales with evergreen appeal.

VELVET SKIES, surf, sand, and sea breeze fanning the flames of a bonfire to vigorous life. Around the fire, expectant faces shine in firelight as the storyteller, in white cotton dhoti and turban, walks in to begin the session.

"My name is Tharani and I am going to tell you stories that I have collected from the villages around here. Of rich men and poor men, good men and bad, of battles won and lost..." The scene is set for yet another Saturday night storytelling session for hotel guests at the Taj's Fishermen's Cove. The magic of firelight, the soft lapping of the waves, the quiet of regions that wake with the sun and cease activity with its setting, above all the luxury of sitting on the cool sands, lifted the evening to one of those perfect moments which life is supposed to be made of. And considering the predominance of adults in the group - probably fifteen to the four children - one can understand the proliferation of storytelling clubs all over the world today, not only as an antidote to the stresses of daily life but as a pleasant pastime that also promotes understanding in multi- cultural societies.

So, sitting in this strategically located cove on the East Coast which has, by turns, been under the Dutch, the Nawabs, the French and the British (the Fort, now in ruins, was built in 1744 by the Nawab of Arcot) and seen sieges, coups and historic battles, we sat listening to Tharani spin his tales of love and deceit, greed and punishment, sibling rivalry, royal rage and peasant simplicity.

Tharani is the animator at the Hotel's Activity Desk. One usually found him chalking out the activities for the day on a little blackboard or surrounded by children checking about timings for the swimming competition or the sand castle building and adults with a yen for adventure finding out how to go about deep sea fishing or catamaran rides five kilometers into the sea...

"I belong to a fishing community myself and traditional Indian stories interest me. I collect stories from the villages around and also from books. Ecology and conservation are my other interests and when the audience for the storytelling around the bonfire is made up mainly of children, I weave these themes too into the stories", he says. One can see his passionate involvement in all the activities the Hotel promotes, whether it is swimming in the high seas or fishing at Muthukkadu, going on Nature walks along the beach or into the scrub which is home to flora and fauna of many species, birdwatching at the Estuary, cycling (eco-friendly mode of transport) for sight-seeing, taking groups on Night Walks in the December-March period when the Olive Ridley turtles come ashore to nest and lay eggs (Turtle Walks are held to collect the eggs and conserve the species as many of these are eaten by predators) and organising snake-catching trips with the help of members of the Irula tribe - snakes are captured and taken to the Crocodile Farm nearby where the venom is extracted for research and the snakes are released back into the wild. For those craving for a different kind of excitement, there, amid salt mines and watermelon fields, is the 800-year old Nritya Kalyan Perumal Koil. Locals believe that a visit to the place by anyone who wants to get married will soon put plans in motion.

Ballads, folk tales, songs, myths and legends belong to the oral tradition of folk literature. Anthropologists and sociologists use folk tales in their research to understand the emotional patterns of people and the similarities in folk traditions in common tales found in regions geographically far apart point to certain universal commonalities which have become subjects of serious study in universities today.

A.K. Ramanujam is one of the well known chroniclers of Indian folk tales. The Encyclopaedia Britannica says, "In many preliterate cultures, folk tales are hardly to be distinguished from myths, since especially in tales of tricksters and heroes, they presuppose a background of belief about tribal origins and the relation of men and god. Consciousous fictions, however, enter even into such stories. Animals abound here whether in their natural form or anthropomorphised so that they seem sometimes men and sometimes adventure stories, exaggerations, marvels of all kinds and narratives of marriage or sexual adventure, usually between human beings and animals, are common..." It is perhaps this freedom from rigidity, a breaking of the bonds that real life imposes on us and the temporary return to an unspoilt state that still exists in these timeless tales, that has an unfailing appeal to adult listeners.

Folk tales are fiction that has no specific location in time or place and therefore easy to mould into the belief patterns of various groups. "Despite its element of fantasy, a folktale is actually a symbolic way of presenting the different means by which human beings cope with the world in which they live" says T. Morris, devising a lesson plan based on an Australian Aboriginal legend. Because of the freedom that the oral tradition provides, the storyteller can improvise within the broad framework, increasing credibility by adding local cultural touches.

And so we have a Tharani, using his enthusiasm for local tales as a vehicle to carry his other passions of ecology and conservation as he tells stories by the sea of greedy brothers cheating the youngest of his share in the family wealth, of the cunning fox saving the turtle from death, of the miser who came to grief... The waves continue to weave their ceaseless music, the flames of the dying bonfire dimly light the faces round it, fisherfolk return folding their nets, with fresh fish and intriguing white bundles. As they walk past, the fire dies, the stories come to an end.

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