A South African storyteller made his way to DeKalb and took a few dozen Northern Illinois University Alumni on a journey Thursday, March 7.
Rob Caskie is a storyteller, keynote speaker and cultural guide. He has been telling stories for over two decades. He started his speaking career by telling the story of the Anglo-Zulu war that took place in 1879. This battle was a fight between the British Empire and the Zulu Kingdom in South Africa. The story he told at the Barsema Alumni and Visitors Center Thursday took the audience to a place where the weather conditions were much icier than the South African setting. He told the story of explorer Ernest Shackleton and his travels through Antarctica, which he said is a journey that aligns with the NIU Huskie spirit.
“The Huskie morals, the Huskie aspirations," Caskie explained, "in terms of fortitude, tenacity, toughness, community spirit, all these things."
Caskie stood in front of the room as he began to set the scene. He used a wooden cane and his body movements to help carry the story along. As the story progressed, Caskie took his words to the crowd, who wore name tags for a greater engagement experience.
“He kept the audience engaged by approaching them and talking to them, calling them by name,” said audience member Andy Schumacher.
Schumaker was there with his wife. He said they will travel to Buenos Aires, Argentina and around Cape Horn, Africa this summer and it was good to hear stories that touched on those areas.
Colin Booth was also in the audience. He said he was always interested in Shackleton’s expedition so hearing this story was delightful. He said he was also surprised that Caskie did everything from memory.
“Without any, you know, visual aids, any slides or anything like that?" he said. "It was just he just kept us really absorbed."
Caskie said a great story is much like a good piece of music.
“It needs to have a very good beginning, that creates in the listener the desire — or not — to engage, and to listen further,” he said. “It then requires cadence and volume and repetition, pause, and so forth.”
He said stories also need a spine that takes the listener from A to Z, and it must be told from a human perspective instead of facts, figures and statistics.
Another part of Caskie's DeKalb visit was to talk to NIU students. He said it’s important to speak with the youth. He said he hopes that he sparks a deep interest in the art of storytelling.
“To get their messages across,” he added. “So, my reason for speaking to the students here in NIU is multifaceted in terms of the art of storytelling more so than the content of the stories.”
Caskie said when he was in college, he played rugby and studied agriculture: If someone had told him 25 years ago that he would make a living by telling stories around the world, he would have laughed. He said we have no clue how our lives will turn out. He encourages everyone to seize opportunities that come along. He sums these thoughts up by quoting a stanza from Poet Robert Browning. Caskie said that Browning was a favorite of Ernest Shackleton, who was also a poet.
“And that stanza reads, ‘I hold that a man should strive to the uttermost for his life’s set prize,’ said Caskie. "Now, I've changed that a little, and I say, 'I hold today, that a man or woman should strive to the uttermost for their life’s set prize.'”
Caskie said he hopes that everyone who attends his storytelling sessions leaves with the desire to aim for the best in whatever field of work they are in.
