Re-telling stories

An interesting thing has happened in a recent Global Short Story Competition, namely that two writers entered stories with the same storyline.

So since the stories are similar, does that devalue them? Of course, the answer is no, they are as valid as each other. Each stands on its own merits.

The theory is that there are only a small number of stories to be told - the children’s writing centre on Tyneside, here in the North East of England, is called Seven Stories because that is the number of children’s stories, apparently.

It is the same theory as racehorses - that every racehorse in the world is related to just three bloodlines.

What makes writing endlessly fascinating is the way writers take those stories and tell and re-tell them, infusing them with their own passions and style, giving them their own original twists and their own personal insight.

That is why the two stories that came in are so rewarding because both tell the same story in a distinctive and, in the end, deeply effective way. And that is all that matters.

John Dean