perhaps with a new hook (though how he would get one is never explained). The story is most effective for those who have not heard it before, but after hearing it several times, with different details, the listener will see that the falsity of the story becomes more apparent.
Writing down the story makes it less effective for another reason as well--the gestures and demeanor of the speaker are now missing. A reader will get the same details of the story, but he or she will not see the way the speaker tells it, the hand gestures used at key points to emphasize aspects of the tale or to add to the fear engendered by it. Telling the story around a campfire is a favorite ploy, and the effect of this setting is also lost in the written form. There is also more power to the story when it is told in a communal setting, with a number of listeners heeding every word of the storyteller.
Oral narration has a number of different means of communication operating all at the same time, and these different elements need to be coordinated to convey the same meaning, the same emotion, the same attitude to the listener. The use of the term "listener" should not hide the fact that the listener is also a viewer, a person who sees the demeanor of the speaker, his or her tendency to gesture, and other signs of body language and attitude that communicate the meaning of the story.
Certainly, the act of transcribing the story causes that story to lose something that was strong in the oral presentation. The aural and visual elements are important in oral narrative. The language is also important, and it as well grows, develops, and changes over time as different people tell the same story, embellishing it here, making major changes there, and turning the story from a simple one into a more complex one. Fairy tales are an expression of lasting values and social attitudes, but they are also a means of personal communication and an expression of ...