Dreams of Arcadia

Storytellers draw on an almost endless well of characters, some based on people they’ve encountered in real-life, others thumbnail sketches of people they’ve observed that have been provided a backstory and behaviors plucked from the teller’s imagination.  The purpose of the latter is to serve as a kind of verbal shorthand for presenting characters that an audience can immediately recognize, much the same way a character actor in a film presents a “type” that viewers can immediately relate to. Continue reading »