The Reinvention of Storytelling

Where do you think Shakespeare ranks among the greatest of the storytellers? We all agree that he's got some skills at the poetry, the drama, the character building, the "getting his point across." But how was his story? Many of his plots require some serious suspension of disbelief, no? Or ignoring out outright plot holes?

I've always been fascinated by the core of what "story" means. If you stripped away Shakespeare's words and still told the story, would it still speak to the truth of what it means to be human like the original does? How much of the message is in the words, versus the action between the characters? Obviously there's something there, as people have been "inspired" to run with Shakespeare for centuries, from fan fiction to video games. But if you lose the power the minute you lose the words, why would we keep doing it? Surely there's something in the story itself that Shakespeare put together. Shakespeare borrowed his stories, and built on them. So did he perfect them? Or is that the pursuit we're all still engaging in?

With that in mind let me introduce "The Reinvention Summit", a virtual conference on the future of storytelling.

Reinvention Summit: 2-week Virtual Summit on Future of Storytelling, Nov 11-22, 2010.

We are gathering a new tribe of storytellers: change-makers, marketers, entrepreneurs, and creatives who see storytelling as critical to their work and mission. There’s a star-studded line-up of 25+ speakers with diverse backgrounds to lead teleseminars, interviews, and panel discussions that relate to the future of storytelling as our world goes through reinvention. All sessions are recorded for playback. The online summit includes lots of social networking, collaboration, and crowd-sourcing for those who feel inspired to play. Entry-level pricing starts at just $11.11. To learn more: visit www.reinventionsummit.com.

Disclosure : I was contacted about this directly, but I'm not receiving any particular compensation for it. They do have several "thank you" offers to help get the word out (detailed here) but as far as I can tell, access to those offers is not contingent on posting anything special.