If you've been visiting our ridiculous website for the past 3 years, then you probably never knew Storyteller is not the only incarnation; over the years there were incarnations since the early 1900's, bringing stories to many people from various writers.
Just to be clear, none of these incarnations are related or connected to us and within themselves despite sharing the same name, but we all shared one goal, telling stories. Each incarnation is unique in its own right. So here we go.
The First Storyteller
1907-1937
This first incarnation of Storyteller was the British magazine offering pulp-fiction stories, it was known as "The Story-Teller". The magazine offered various stories from many prominent authors, including G. K. Chesterton, William Hope Hodgson, Rudyard Kipling, Katherine Mansfield, Sax Rohmer, Edgar Wallace, H. G. Wells, Oliver Onions, Bernard Capes, Hall Caine, Marjorie Bowen, E. Phillips Oppenheim, Alice & Claude Askew, and Tom Gallon. Each issue of the magazine was at least over 150 pages long. The price of the magazines back then varied from 4½ d old pence or one shelling, depending on the magazine issue. (A "pence" is equivalent to the penny) The magazine made its thirty-year run from 1907 to 1937. 367 issues were published only in the United Kingdom during its 30-year life; it was also reprinted in Canada.
Initially published by Cassell & Co, The Story-Teller was edited by Newman Flower from its debut in April 1907 until 1928, when Clarence Winchester became the editor. In May 1927, the magazine changed his name in Storyteller when it began to be published by Amalgamated Press and, later on, merged with Cassell's Magazine in 1932.
The Second Storyteller
1960 - 1965
According to Philsp.com, all stories in this British magazine were submitted as "contest entries" with รบ25 being paid for the prizewinning story and รบ5 for each other story and was called Storyteller Contest. At some point the title on the cover at least changed to Storyteller and in 1964 the magazine title changed to International Storyteller, although the stories were still mainly by newcomers from the UK.
The Third Storyteller
1982-1985
The second incarnation was the British magazine in the 1980's, known as "Story Teller", was aimed at children, offering a selection of children's stories, some traditional folk tales like "Anansi the Spiderman", some children's tales such as Gobbolino, the Witch's Cat, and some contemporary works written especially for the series, like "Timbertwig". Most issues contained a poem or two, as well. The stories were accompanied by lavish color artwork, and inside each issue was an offer to purchase custom made binders for the magazine as well as cases to hold the tapes. Each issue of Story Teller came with a cover-mounted cassette tape containing a reading of the stories, complete with music and sound effects. What set Story Teller apart from other partworks was the stories were read by professional actors and celebrities of the time, including Richard Briers, Sheila Hancock, Derek Jacobi, and Nigel Lambert. In Australia and New Zealand it was called "Story Time".
Two distinguishing features of the audio cassettes were the "Story Teller" jingle that introduced and ended each tape and the characteristic "ping" that sounded when the time came to turn the pages to encourage children to read along. The "Story Teller" jingle is an existing track called "Children's Carnival" by Ted Atking and Alain Feanch.
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| Image: storytellerwebsite.wordpress.com |
Longer stories were split over multiple issues to encourage parents to buy the next issue. These were referred to as Story Teller Serials. As one serial came to end, another would start. Many of these would be simple two-part stories, but a selection of stories (usually well-known ones such as Peter Pan and the Wizard of Oz) were spread over several issues. Pinocchio was the longest serial, with seven installments.
The original collection was 26 issues long with each tape lasting up to 45 minutes. An exception was issue 26, which was 90 minutes long because it also contained the special preview issue for Story Teller 2, which immediately followed the original series. The magazine ran between 1982 and 1985. It was published by Marshall Cavendish.
The Fourth Storyteller
1987
The third incarnation was the Australian quarterly magazine committed to promoting Australian writers and writings. All of the stories were compiled by Ann Grant. Unpublished stories of around 500-4000 words are where welcome to submit and the rates payable for contributors are $39.00 per thousand words. Unlike the previous the Storytellers, it didn't last but a couple issues in 1987. It was published by Brooks Waterloo and South Melbourne. Both issues cost $5.95 AU ($4.11 US)
The Fifth Storyteller
1994-2008
The fourth incarnation was the Canadian magazine that contain many short stories from various Canadian writers that challenged them to make their stories take place in Canada. Like finding yourself hiking through an old-growth forest in B.C., or falling in love on the prairies, or tailing someone with a secret in Newfoundland, or sharing bagels with an alien in Toronto.
Created by Terry Tyo, the magazine offered many short stories across many genres including Comedy, Adventure, Mystery, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Romance, and much more. Each issue costed around $7.95 CA ($6.12 US).
The magazine was independently self-published by Terry Tyo and it ran from 1994 to 2008.
The Sixth Storyteller
2011- Present
The sixth and latest incarnation of Storyteller was founded as a studio in 2011 formerly called BrentArts, named after its original founder. After the founder left, A. E. Firestone took over the studio and created a publishing imprint and renamed it to Storyteller in 2015.
Then this humorous website was created in 2019 and expand on telling short stories, comics, non-fiction articles, opinions, reviews, jokes, and satire on the glorious internet. The publishing imprint and the website was originally aimed at Virginians and the rest of the Southern United States, as half of the stories take place in Virginia and the South but welcomes other cousins of the English-speaking world. The website also serves as a hub and internet portal to the alternative underground, away from mainstream content.
So, now you know about Storyteller's incarnations and history. We all got a story to tell.
Links
Storyteller (Marshall Cavendish)
https://storytellerwebsite.wordpress.com/
Storyteller (1994-2008)
http://web.archive.org/web/20051222034612/http://www.storytellermagazine.com/index.htm
Others
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