A special thanks to Red Rocker for sending this post to me!

Humans developed complex language somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago. It might have happened gradually – or very quickly. Shortly thereafter, the first storyteller entertained the tribe around the fire by telling stories about the day’s hunt. Or maybe the first storyteller was a traveler, bringing news about the tribe who lived on the other side of the mountain.  The oldest such story we know about is the epic of Gilgamesh, a king of Sumeria who lived almost 3,000 years ago.  The epic tells of the friendship of Gilgamesh and Enkidu, of the death of Enkidu,  of the grief of Gilgamesh, and his subsequent quest for the secret of eternal life.

This is how Gilgamesh weeps for his friend, Enkidu:

“How can I rest, how can I be at peace? Despair is in my heart. What my brother is now, that shall I be when I am dead. Because I am afraid of death I will go as best I can to find Utnapishtim whom they call the Faraway, for he has entered the assembly of the gods.’

And this is the answer he hears:

“Gilgamesh, what you seek you will never find. For when the Gods created Man they let death be his lot, eternal life they withheld”.

Sound familiar at all?

Storytelling never went out of style. But with the advent of paper and the printing press and mass literacy, storytellers were not in as much demand. Nowadays, we also have newspapers, the radio, the movies, television, not to mention the internet and ipods and e-books and the latest of all, the Tablet. Ironic that, given how Gilgamesh also came to us on a set of tablets – ones made of clay.  But the fascination of listening to the storyteller has never gone out of style. At bedtime, in a classroom, in a pub, around the campfire, we still perk up our ears when we hear the words “Here is a story.”

In recognition of the tradition of oral storytelling, the Swedes came up with something they called Alla berättares dag (All storytellers day), a national day for storytelling. The idea took hold in other countries, so that nowadays each year the March Equinox,  March 20th,  is known as World Storytelling Day. According to Wikipedia:

On World Storytelling Day, as many people as possible tell and listen to stories in as many languagesand at as many places as possible, during the same day and night.

My thought was, we here at the Hog’s Head are united by our love of  one story in particular, and of stories in general. Why not celebrate Storytelling Day at our virtual pub by telling each other stories? In other words, why not have our own storytelling marathon?

Of course our stories would be in electronic text form because we can’t talk to one another (at least, not yet). But except for that, they should parallel the intent of Storytelling day as much as possible. They should be stories we’ve heard, not read about. They should be stories we’ve heard from real people – not the television, or movies. Audiobooks are  tempting, but for this event, let’s exclude them. We want to try to recreate the oral tradition, as much as possible.

Timing is crucial. We’ll set up the post for the marathon on March 19th. As soon as the clock strikes midnight on March 20th in your time zone, you’re free to start telling us a story. As long as it’s still March 20th in  your time zone, you can keep adding stories. The more of us join in, the more fun it will be.

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Decisions about academic programming for Infinitus 2010 are starting to hit inboxes. I’m already on the schedule for two presentations – one Friday and one Saturday – and I’ve just received word that I’ll be sitting on two panel discussions as well.

The Potter Pundits will once again be together, live at Infinitus 2010! While we’re currently working on plans for a live PotterCast and Pundits show, we’ll also be joining the academic programming.

The second panel I’ll be joining is called “Less Umbridge, More Lupin: Using Harry Potter in the Classroom.”

I’ve yet to decide on the content and titles of my Featured Presentation talks, but I’ll let you know as soon as you do. This is going to be a fantastic conference, and I hope to see a lot of you there. Register here!

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LOST: “Recon”

by Travis Prinzi on March 16, 2010

We’ve been asking for a few episodes now, “What happened to Sawyer?” A Sawyer-centric episode gives us some help on that. I’m also thinking that Jack Bauer needs to stroll on over to the island and shout, “WE’RE RUNNING OUT OF TIME!” It’s another episode that’s long on mysteries and short on answers. Spoilers below. [click to continue…]

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Select you favourite and let us know why.
If you have any adventures or characters you’d like to share go right ahead.

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Chapter 20: Xenophilius Lovegood

by Behold a Phoenix 03.12.2010

This is another transition chapter between the important events surrounding the Silver Doe and Xenophilius Lovegood’s explanation of the Deathly Hallows in the next two chapters. Hermione is still not speaking to Ron, and Ron is reciprocating this by watching his conduct around her because of his remorse over his actions. Ron however is excited [...]

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LOST: “Dr. Linus”

by Arabella Figg 03.11.2010

Dr. Linus, tell me what’s wrong
You’re enchained by your own sorrow
In your eyes there is no hope for tomorrow
You were always sure of yourself
Now I’ve seen you’ve broken a feather
–Chiquitita by Abba
Ah, how the mighty have fallen. Ben Linus, former ruthless Leader of the Others, has broken more than a feather; Big Bird has [...]

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Harry Potter “Feeble”, Rowling’s Success “Depressing”

by Travis Prinzi 03.11.2010

Here’s something to get your blood pressure up this morning. Toby Young, a freelance writer, gives a series of bare assertions about how sad it is that literature as “second-rate” as Harry Potter has been so successful:
But on the other hand, there’s something depressingly second-rate about the Harry Potter franchise. The books are a bland [...]

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The Next Harry Potter?

by revgeorge 03.10.2010

I saw a comment over at Hogwarts Professor which reminded me of another article I had seen on the proclivities of people to compare the next big thing with Harry Potter.  The quote at HogPro was in regard to the Percy Jackson series.  The quote  of which it reminded me was from a young girl’s [...]

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