ABSTRACT
The modern storytelling event is usually a staged affair to which listeners come with the sole intention of hearing stories. Whether told to children or to adults, stories have the power to entrance listeners, to captivate them, if they are good stories well told. Sometimes this enchantment is so extensive, listeners enter “an altered state of consciousness verging on hypnosis: the ‘storylistening trance’” (Stallings, p. 6). Listeners sit immobile, breathing slows, and eyes widen as the story unfolds. These characteristics are similar to those exhibited by hypnotized clients: “pupil dilation, flattened cheeks, skin pallor, lack of movement, slowed blink and swallowing reflex, [and] lowered and slowed respiration” (Lankton and Lankton, p. 66).
