The Storyhunter

In the late 1960s, Harold Scheub traveled through Africa on a hunt. But he wasn’t looking for big game. He wanted to capture and preserve the stories of local communities, stories that had been handed down through the generations.

Storytellers are constantly in the process of taking ancient images and casting them into contemporary kinds of forms. And so there’s no such thing as an original story. I don’t care where it is, whether it’s written or oral, the fact is that every story has been heard before. Every story has been told before. So if we’re looking for originality we’re going to find it, but in unique kinds of ways. We’re not going to find it in the way the story is told, we’re not going to find it in the story itself. It’s that connection, that’s the important thing. Connections are everything. Connecting the present and the past, connecting the storyteller and the audience.

Stories are powerful tools in copywriting and direct marketing. Check out the full interview to see what you can learn to improve your storytelling skills.