De werkelijkheid van het verhaal. Naar een antropologie van het vertellen

Samenvatting

The reality of the story. Towards an anthropology of story-telling. The present paper deals with the question why stories exist and why people tell them and listen to them. Point of departure is the distinction between stories in so far as they are about (some kind of) reality and the way they take themselves in reality. The structural and linguistic qualities of stories allow them to fulfill a very general function, i.e. that of transferring knowledge and values concerning human experience. In this sense, stories may be characterized as quasi-universal anthropological artefacts. As far as literary stories are concerned, a more specific function is proposed. Central to this function is the way in which it enhances the experience of deliverance. The Tales of Thousand and One Nights exemplifies this function within its structure and content most clearly. Methodological problems with respect to the application of this insight to other (types of) narrative texts are discussed. It emerges that the distinction between the reality the story is about and the reality the storytelling takes place in, is of crucial importance in this respect. Deliverance is thus not necessarily present in the thematic material of the story. However, within the activity of telling the story in reality, some kind of deliverance - from the catastrophes depicted in the story's content - is experienced by the listener/reader. This experiential aspect is a constant in the way stories operate functionally in reality.