h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Oh I like it, Pally. Interesting that one of the advanced Toastmasters manuals is Tall Tales. It's something that I don't at the moment have the confidence to do, because I didn't understand properly how they worked.

One thing that would help me - how do you get inspiration? Is there a technique for dreaming up story elements or do you have to be creative to begin with?

For most everybody, in my opinion, the really creative part of storytelling is in the delivery. Some storytellers write, but all storytellers act. So, if you're getting started, don't worry about writing - just go to the library and start reading lots of them - find one you like and start adapting it.

The thing about tall tales is that you can start with a perfectly regular story - even an old chestnut that everyone knows - and it becomes tall when you first put yourself in as the principle character and then look for opportunities to stretch some of the bits.

It's a process too and so doesn't require a burst of creativity but only practice and trial and error with voices, accents, expressions and tweaks to the text.

Does that help?

Makes perfect sense. Thanks

I enjoyed this, coming as I do from tall-tale country (the South).

A district attorney I knew was once voted 'the second biggest liar in North Carolina', due to his having won one of these contests.

They're still trying to sort out the judicial review...

second best eh? that's the stuff

Say, ZSF it occurs to me I didn't really answer your question - how do you get inspiration, is there a technique.

I seem to have gone off into generalities, but here is a more direct answer. First, the best way to come up with a tall tale is to start with the nub - and then let things work themselves out from there.

So, lets say you decide to adapt a fairy tale into a useful tall tale for Toastmasters and suppose you decide that the nub should be a talking fish that grants three wishes. Here would be a loosely based example of where that could go:

Setup - You haven't got a topic for tonight's speech, are hoping for last minute inspiration when you step into a pie and mash shop for eel pie as it's well known to be good for the brain. You take your pie outside to a park bench, open it and take the first bite

Nub - You hear a voice, look at the pie and see a frightened eel who says, "please don't eat me and i'll grant you three wishes." Astonished, you say "This is perfect, I was just wishing for a topic for a speech." "Done" says the eel. "No wait - that wasn't my first wish" ...

Bring it home - Here one could have a dog race up and grab the pie with the eel - you begin a tug of war and finally you shout "I wish you would let go" - which the dog does - you fall back the eel goes flying. "Oh the devil take it" you exclaim and a gull catches it - and you are left with nothing.

Stupid proof - Except for this topic which is all that remains, so that proves it.

Alternatively, you could say that you think the eel was a fake as you really didn't get any wishes, not even a topic, which proves it.

Anyway, fairy tales are a treasure trove and the only difference, after all, between a fairy tale and a tall tale is that fairy tales always start with "once upon a time" and tall tales never do - they are more likely to start with "this really happened"

I like it Pally! I love fairy tales and have quite a few boods of them - as you say - a treasure trove of material. I really like the idea of stupid proof - I'd never heard of that before.