Tales from the heart: Check out this online storytelling session this weekend

Storytelling and poetry open mics by Kommune

If you are someone who enjoys a good storytelling session, the folks at Kommune have a cool initiative for you. Kathakar is an evening where they will showcase real-life Hindi and English anecdotal stories. The event will include 12 heart-warming tales narrated by storytellers who hail from states like Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Jammu and Kashmir, Delhi, Karnataka and West Bengal.

Kommune's community manager, Pradumn Chourey, shared, "I remember a quote by director Martin Scorsese that said, ‘the most personal is the most creative,' which makes me believe that the stories that are in and around us are the most effective ones. These are the stories that I believe are more magical than our imaginations. We are working towards our goal of encouraging people to narrate real-life stories on our stage."

Pradumn Chourey

The tagline for the evening - real people, real stories - will explore the themes of friendship, love, romance, relationships, travel, body image, social commentary, and much more. The participants will be judged by screenwriter and lyricist Neeraj Pandey and storyteller and author Himanshu Bajpai. "It feels good to be a part of an event that is working towards building an inclusive community of artists, and I hope we discover some strong and unique voices during this time," shares Pandey. The platform frequently organises such storytelling events, both offline and online, and conducted more than 50 spoken word events last year. For Kathakar, they received over 150 entries but could only shortlist the top 12, shares Shantanu Anand, content and community lead at Kommune.

Mansi Jain, who is one of the selected participants, shares, "Although I've always been interested in storytelling, I had no idea that I could make it my career. I have tried to increase my understanding of this art form over the last several years with the help of YouTube and social media, and I started pursuing it professionally in 2019. I'm a storyteller at heart, and I'm hoping this platform will help me to share my work with a wider audience."

On July 17; 7 pm
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Free