THE JOY
OF STORY
John M.
Daniel’s Blog
November
19, 2016
One of the reasons we writers
write is to teach, or even preach, in order to sell a point we want our readers
to learn and agree with. But how do we get readers to sit still and pay
attention to a lecture or a sermon? Especially in the modern age of sensory
overload, the last thing we want to inspire is a snore. We want our readers to
ask for more, or at least to pay attention. How do we do that?
We entertain. We
illustrate the points we want to make. An illustration can come in the form of
a visual image, or it can be made with a story full of enchanting language and
attention-grabbing hooks. We once again slide into home plate by showing, not
telling.
It’s been said that a
picture is worth a thousand words. I don’t know who did the math on that one,
but it stands to reason, then, that a picture plus a thousand-word story is a bargain, a two-fer. There’s no
reason one form of illustration has to be “worth” more than the other,
especially when we can have both.
That’s a point I want to
sell to you. So far, I’ve done a pretty lame job by my own standards, because I
haven’t illustrated my point with an entertaining story.
Please welcome John McKinney,
a.k.a. The Trailmaster, who comes to my rescue, bringing a delightful story of
how graphic art and a well-told tale work together. And play together. John is
the author of more than thirty books on hiking—where to find the best trails,
and how best to enjoy them—and he was for years the hiking columnist for the Los Angeles Times. He’s a spellbinding
tale-teller, who also is inspired by graphic art. I’m not going to tell you
about that. I’ll let John McKinney show you.
§§§
EVERY ICON TELLS A STORY
by
John McKinney
“Every icon tells a story.…”
So begins my
new book, Hiking the Holy Mountain: Tales
of Monks and Miracles on the Trails of Mount Athos, Greece. Icons play a
major role in the true story of an accidental pilgrimage I made back in time
and faith to monasteries perched on a remote peninsula in Greece where no woman
has set foot in a thousand years.
My story begins
at the annual St. Barbara Day (December 4) ceremony at St. Barbara Greek
Orthodox Church in Santa Barbara California. After an hour or so of a special
liturgy, with prayers and chanting as old as Byzantium, all of a sudden—and
unaccountably—light shines through the east window of the church and
illuminates the icon of St. Barbara. Only on St. Barbara Day, and only for a
few moments, does the icon of St. Barbara receive such light.
As the story
goes, bright and beautiful Barbara was locked in a tower by her father
Dioscorus, who demanded she renounce her faith. When Barbara refused, he
beheaded his daughter on the fourth day of December, 280 a.d. Not long thereafter Dioscorus was
struck by lightning; his body ignited like a Roman candle and he was engulfed
in flames.
When my son
Daniel was a little guy, I explained that icons are paintings that tell the
story of Christian faith through events that really happened and people who
really lived. At the same time, icons are not painted in a realistic style—the
people have flat faces, and the backgrounds are two-dimensional, shadowless.
But this symbolic, unrealistic style appeals to kids, and my son liked looking
at pictures of icons while I told him tales of the holy men and women they
depicted.
Because the
stilted accounts of the holy men and women available to me had scant
biographical detail, I confess I embellished the stories of the saints and took
certain artistic liberties to be sure they captured my child’s attention. Like
many parents, I’ve found I can be more effective at enlightening kids if I’m at
least a little entertaining.
These days when
we think of icons we nearly always think of those little colored symbols on our
digital devices. The most recognizable icons of our ages? Perhaps the iTunes
icon or Facebook icon. Surely, nearly everyone, even the most devout Christians
among us, think of icons in terms of apps, not apostles.
I didn’t spend
much time thinking about icons of the ancient kind either, until my friend
Spiro joined me on an odyssey to Mt. Athos. Truly we were the hiking odd
couple: Spiro was a tenderfoot, and I the expert hiker. Spiro was devout and
fluent in Greek, while my faith was shaky and my Greek was terrible. Spiro
believed in the wonder-working powers of the saint and icons, while I was a
skeptic who doubted all miracles.
That is until I
encountered an icon, a monk, and a miracle that led to the adoption of my son.
Quite a story.
One monk I met
on the Holy Mountain was a leading iconographer, who explained that he and his
fellow iconographers did not paint icons, they wrote them. In Greek, an ikonographos is an icon writer. When the
wise monk learned I was writer, he suggested: “Perhaps you’ll write a story of
the icons some day.”
He was right.
That’s exactly what I have done.
John McKinney is the author of The Hiker’s Way and Hiking on the Edge, and a passionate
advocate for hiking and our need to reconnect with nature. He lives and writes
in Santa Barbara, California. http://www.thetrailmaster.com
Buy
links for Hiking the Holy Mountain:
§§§
Call for submissions: Your 99-Word
Stories
The
deadline for December’s 99-word story submissions is December 1. The stories
will appear on my blog post for December 10, and will stay posted for a week.
note: this 99-word story feature
is a game, not a contest. Obey the rules and I’ll include your story. I may
edit the story to make it stronger, and it’s understood that you will submit to
my editing willingly. That’s an unwritten rule.
Rules for the 99-word
story feature are as follows:
1. Your story must be 99
words long, exactly.
2. One story per writer,
per month.
3. The story must be a
story. That means it needs plot (something or somebody has to change),
characters, and conflict.
4. The story must be
inspired by the prompt I assign.
5. The deadline: the
first of the month. Stories will appear on this blog the second Saturday of the
month.
6. I will copy edit the
story. The author of the story retains all rights.
7.
Email me your story (in the body of your email, or as a Word attachment) to: jmd@danielpublishing.com
THIS
MONTH’S PROMPT FOR NEXT MONTH’S 99-WORD STORY: Write a story
inspired by the following sentence: A
fine romance this turned out to be.
§§§
Calling
all published authors—
I try to feature a guest
author the third Saturday (and week following) of each month. If you’re
interested in posting an essay on my blog—it’s also a chance to promote a
published book—email me directly at jmd@danielpublishing.com.
§§§
Thank you for visiting.
Please drop by next week.
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