 |
| Author Sanjoy Das |
Storytellers come in many forms. But ever since Gutenberg, the traditional oral storyteller has almost disappeared. Where do you still find them today? Maybe in a remote hill village, a jungle campfire, or a forgotten corner of the country—where people still tell stories, not for fame or prizes, but simply for the joy of telling.
For the last 25 years, I have been writing fiction. But am I really a “storyteller”? The line between a writer and a storyteller is fuzzy, and honestly, not my primary concern. What matters to me is the experience of stories—how they live, travel, and transform.
Recently, I watched The Storyteller, Ananth Mahadevan’s film based on a short story by Satyajit Ray. At its heart is a fascinating clash: an oral storyteller meets a businessman who secretly longs to be a writer. Who truly “owns” a story—the one who tells it or the one who pens it?
That question took me back to my days in Dehradun (2007–2012), when I had the privilege of knowing an unforgettable oral storyteller—Dr. Sanjoy Das. We spent almost five years in close company. Every evening, he would take us into the jungle or sometimes into the comfort of a hotel lounge, and then—story after story would flow.
He was a wildlife enthusiast and photographer, and his tales often came from real adventures in forests across India. Some had supernatural twists, others were so wild that I doubted them. Years later, I met a few of the “characters” in real life and realised his stories were true.
Despite his gift, he was strangely reluctant to publish. He had a coffee-table book ready, but instead of printing, he kept “finishing” it in Photoshop. For years! Whenever I suggested meeting a publisher, he dodged the idea—just like Tarini Bandopadhyay in The Storyteller.
At times, I wondered—did he really want his book out in the world? Or was telling the story enough for him? I even tried helping him connect with publishers, but nothing worked out before I left Dehradun in 2012.
Much later, the book finally came out. When I visited him a few months ago, he gifted me a copy. Holding it, I felt a strange pride. I hadn’t written a single line, yet I was part of it—because I had lived inside those stories for years.
The experience reminded me of another film—Big Fish. Its protagonist is also an extravagant storyteller, while his son, a writer, keeps questioning the truth of his tales. Only when the son meets the people from those stories does he finally reconcile with his father’s world.
For me, Dr. Sanjoy Das is my own “Big Fish.” His reluctant masterpiece may have taken years, but his stories—told with the same intensity every time—were always alive, somewhere between myth and truth. And perhaps that is what makes a real storyteller.
