Tall Tales

“A tall tale is a story with unbelievable elements, related as if it were true and factual.”

Tall tales were the ones that put men on the path of storytelling bending everything against the law of nature with their imaginations. One could see them in the form of mythologies and folk-lore; in folk tales about heroes who went on in incredibly adventurous journeys, beasts and creatures turning into beautiful princes after they get redeemed from their curses.  As time went by, readers/audience began to question the logic underneath a story which pushed writers to keep the exaggerations at the bay or make it more subtle. I recently read that when the writer(s) wrote the movie “Hacksaw Ridge”, they had to down play some of the real facts about Pfc.Desmond T.Doss’ action on the field to make it more believable. I grew up in India hearing these tall tales. They were there everywhere - in our epics, bed-time stories, novels and movies. If you have read Mahabharata, the Indian epic, then you don’t need any explanations. Many believe that everything in Mahabharata did take place in actual and that it is merely a recorded history. But for the sake of argument, let’s assume that it is indeed a fictional story, then I think Mahabharata is the most original and brilliant story in the whole word regardless of the time its being read. The most fascinating thing about Mahabharata is the exaggerations which definitely would sweep the readers off their feet. I believe that all men were designed to love these stories, no matter how illogical they might seem. It’s really beautiful to read/hear about things that can happen only in stories. It’s beautiful to see our imaginations take a wild run against all logics. I think such tastes of us are etched in our DNA. Today, tall tales have become a genre in itself. There are a few movies which uses such elements like “A monster calls”, “Tale of tales”. To me writing was all about writing screenplays until a few years back. When I took to writing books, I thought I should appeal to the human side of the readers not to their analytical knowledge. And what better way to do that than incorporate the elements of tall tales in my stories. I am a story teller; it doesn’t matter if it’s a screenplay or a book, I think I should always tell people something they all are designed to love. My first book is a mystery-crime novel. When I talk about a murder, I didn’t want the people to play the guessing game. I wanted to depict the murders in a way that the readers would feel sorry for the victim and his family; they would fear and hate the murderer. I wanted them to feel disgusted by the crime. I wanted them all to feel more humane. So I started using the elements of exaggerations when I wrote, no matter what the premises are. I had fun doing it and most of all, I loved the way my stories turned out to be. Isn’t that the purpose of art? Isn’t that what our imaginations are supposed to do?

My favorite tall tale is the one that is told in Khaled Hosseini’s novel, “The Kite Runner”. It’s a story of a poor man who found a magic cup that could turn his tears into pearls. Every time he got gloomy, he would cry into that cup and get pearls in return. Things turned out all fine for him and one day, he ran out of things he could feel sad about. So he decided to do something purposefully that could make him sad enough to cry. The man killed his own wife to make him cry. The story ends with the man crying over a pile of pearls with his wife’s body in his arms. This story is told through a character, Amir to which his friend, Hassan, responds, ‘He could have gone into the kitchen and peeled onions.’ The best story ever!