Matters the Story
Posted by: forthrightmag <forthrightmag@...>
http://www.forthright.net
Going straight to the Cross
Outta the way! Story coming through!
Matters the Story
by J. Randal Matheny
"There are no good stories. Only the singer really
matters, seldom the song. What a writer brings to
any story is an attitude, an attitude usually
defined by the wound stripes of life." --John
Gregory Dunne
One Story overwhelms every writer and speaker. The
Good Story. The Great Story. The Good News.
What matters in the telling of this Story is not
the flourish, but faithfulness to its facts.
Fiction, poetry, and "creative writing" (whatever
that is) shrivel before the moving history, the
divine insertion into human humility. Not the
"wound stripes of life" borne by the singer, but
the wound stripes of the Cross make this Story
vibrate with reality, drama, and pathos. More,
with hope, love, faith, and power.
It is not what we, as writers, speakers, humans,
bring to the Story, but what the Story gives to
us. And what we pass on from it to others.
The singer is nothing. The Song is everything. For
He who started singing created the inviolable
Masterpiece.
Variations on the Theme diminish, yeah, destroy,
the Song. One Song, one sustained melody, one
harmony, one chorus.
Come sing with us.
--
You can help us get the word out. Here's how:
forthright.antville.org/stories/340415/