Comparison and Contrast of the Short Story and Oral Narrative. By Henry Kwaghkule.

The short story and oral narrative are subgenres of prose fiction. The short story refers to a literary text with a considerable small length that can be read within a day which discusses one major issue. It is usually less than a novel in size and treats one major issue using few characters,a concise and condensed language and straight plot. It has abrupt starting, a single setting, singleness of event among others as its basic features. According to Edgar Allan Poe as cited in The substance of Literature by Tyoor Victor, "short story is enough to be read in one sitting and constructed to create a single effect" This means a story writer has one particular issue to tackle. Oral narrative on the other hand, is an aspect of oral literature that refer to moonlight stories told with the chief aim of teaching moral lessons especially the younger ones. Oral narrative usually has a lively beginning known as opening glee and state its lessons at the end. In African continent, the trickster's story features a wise and crafty animals often finding itself in terrible situation but amazingly using it craftiness and wisdom to escape as in the Heir in Tiv KwaghLom and the Tortoise in Yoruba Ijapa, all are brief examples of common oral narrative in African setting. A striking feature that contrast the short story and oral narrative is that, the short story neither requires an opening glee nor ending that States the lesson derivable from the story. The tradition of oral narrative is to teach moral lessons to younger generation hence the narrator is expected to state the lesson learnable from the story. Also it is dramatic in nature, the oral narrative begins with an opening glee that invites the already sited audience in the story. The case with the short story is different. Even though it is possible to derive a lesson from a short story the author does not state in his or her narration what he or she considers to be the lessons but allow the readers to judge on their own. Also the beginning of a short story does not include an opening glee at all but rather begins with an action that is so arresting to attract the readers. Because of its advance nature, the short story uses narrative techniques that the oral narrative may not care to use such as suspense, Flash back media res etc. These techniques enable the author to tell a long story in a narratively short time. Media res , for instance is a technique employ by the short story writer to writers in which part of the story is left untold thus the narration begins to the climax. In a layman explanation, a short story has a copy that one can touch but one can't touch a copy of oral narrative as is done orally. Although comparatively, they are aimed at entertaining, educating and informing the society etc. Another point of comparison and contrast is that every short story has a legitimate authorship that creates and makes public the creativity of his ideas for consumption by reading the story. A story of a man who revenge to kill some one base on the primary of insult that occurred for 50 years ago title "The cask of Amontillado" is authored by Edgar Allan Poe and he is known as the owner of the story anywhere in the world. In oral narrative people cannot claimed authorship because the stories are handed down from generation to generation. More so, oral narrative can be move from one place to another with slight modification either by the narrators or their sources. To crown it all in a brief conclusion, oral narrative and short story are sub- genres of prose fiction that works in similar ways because they both need a narration to be realized, they are intended to create a single effect, etc . However they can also be contrasted in the sense that, short stories have authors. While oral narratives do not have authors but are handed down from generation to generation But aims to inform, entertaining, educate and correct things. 

Henry Kwaghkule A short story writer and a script writer. Kwaghkulehenry@gmail.com 08064795340