Storylines: Vol 7, Issue 3

torylines

Wasps and Whispers

Elemental Change

Christine Willison’s keynote speech from this year’s SFS Annual Gathering

“He rarely interacts with strangers.” Roisin Murray shares a poignant storytelling experience. and more inside...

Storylines is the magazine of the Society for Storytelling.

This issue was edited by Tony Cooper. To submit articles and reviews to the editor for future editions, email storylines@sfs.org

Designed by Ned C Respighi, based on an original design by Mike Carter. How to contact the SFS

All enquiries should be sent by email to admin@sfs.org.uk or by post to:

The Society for Storytelling The Glass House Fulcher Avenue Cromer NR27 9SG Tel: 07775 068 886

The Society for Storytelling

Trustees

Paul Jackson (Chair) chair@sfs.org.uk

Tony Cooper storylines@sfs.org.uk

Nicky Rafferty

Cindylou Turner-Taylor Christine Willison Membership Enquiries

Paul Jackson membership@sfs.org.uk

Email Bulletin (for members only) Kevin Blackburn newsletter@sfs.org.uk National Storytelling Week Enquiries

Del Reid via admin@sfs.org.uk

Area Representatives

Martin Manasse (North)

Marion Leeper (East) Cath Edwards (Midlands) Pippa Reid (South) Gary Cordingly (South West) via admin@sfs.org.uk www.sfs.org.uk

From the Editor

Cover Story

Waters of Life & Death - Fiona Collins Features

Never Late to Start Something New - Elaine Mendoza

FEST 2017 - Martin Manasse

FROM THE EDITOR

This magazine is for all of the SFS – and you, our members, should have a lot more say in what we do, how we do it, and how your subscription/membership fee is spent.

I am on the edge of my office chair (a ‘risk’ according to HASWA1974), reading enthusiastic letters from readers. To help you refine this august organ I am making a few suggestions as to content.

Already I have instigated the following section. There will be a new contribution from Roisin Murrey in this edition...

‘Passing Strange’

The huge growing heap of anecdotal evidence of the powers of storytelling to transform, heal, illuminate, unshackle, educate and generally change the tellers and the participants. Science, mathematics and other ‘hard edged’ fields require statically proven results, but storytelling is an ephemeral art. As tellers we see, hear and sometimes record the significant effects that storytelling can have

but we can offer little in the way of ‘hard facts’; how many were effected, what changes did the experience bring about, was the choice of story significant, was the venue or the manner of the telling important?

The following are simply ideas that have floated into my ancient mind; some are practical and obvious while others are ‘left field’, ‘outside the box’, or perhaps ‘plain daft’. Let me know what you think via storylines@sfs.org.uk

‘Letters to the editor’

Praise, criticism, comments on content, suggestions and general “Letting Off Steam”.

‘Learning the Art and Technique’

Storytelling courses – academic, theosophical, practical, city bound or rural, beginner or advanced... News and reviews from the participants and presenters.

‘My First Telling’

We have all had to tell a tale for the very first time. Write an account of this traumatic event as it affected you; where you were, who you told to, how you were received, which story you chose, how you presented yourself and put it all together into an appealing essay of about six hundred to a thousand words. Include a high resolution photo of yourself sent separately from the text email.

‘Quotes’

From Plato to David Davis to Arthur C Clark ‘storytelling’ is one subject that leaps out from the printed page and pings with our consciousness. We could collate and collect them, print them in Storylines and plaster them all over the website too.

‘Cartoon’

There must be a storyteller somewhere who can fashion four panel cartoons of the funny/ wry/surreal/ironic situations that happen to storytellers. Roll up your sleeves and get drawing.

If I could draw I would have the first panel of an empty hall with a sign saying “Storytelling to Combat Family Illiteracy” and a clock showing 10am, the second with an empty hall but for a lone storyteller and the clock showing 2pm, the third with the storyteller asking the organiser how the class was advertised and the fourth showing the organiser saying, “We put advertisements in the papers, we put posters in shops, schools and libraries, and we printed 1,000 leaflets to be delivered to private houses. Nobody seems to have read them.”

True story.

‘Beginnings and Endings’

Tellers’ favourite ways of starting and finishing a tale. Here are a few to start us off: “Once upon a time, not your time nor my time, there was a…”

“Many moons ago, when cats could whistle and pigs would dance…”

“There once was a handsome man – much like you sir, but with fewer teeth and more nose…”

“Now the Celts were not ones for writing at all, so some of this may not be true…”

“So the princess married the one who had made her laugh – she married the donkey!”

“So take this tale – and may all who tell it again add something better.”

“If you want any more lies you must tell them yourselves…” (Roma)

Send in your favourites and we will print one start and one finish per issue.

‘A Club to Remember’

This subheading speaks for itself; don’t forget to ask permission to take photographs or make recordings and explain that you are writing the event up for Storylines. About six hundred to a thousand words, and high resolution images sent separately from the text email.

So let me know what you think. I am waiting here at my MacMini and staring across the road at the house where I was born…

Tony Cooper July 2017

Feature:

Never Late to Start Something New

– Elaine Mendoza shares her journey into storytelling, starting at the age of 69, and recently bringing her to the 2017 Gathering in Plymouth.

In the November of 2015, I attended the Saturday of a Storytelling weekend at Halsway Manor in Somerset just 30 minutes drive from my home. I was looking for a bit of input, intellectual stimulation, entertainment and distraction that would be a change from my usual singing workshops. This weekend looked interesting –but I wasn’t quite ready to commit to the whole thing. A day seemed like a great idea.

I really enjoyed myself, and by bedtime I found myself thinking that maybe I might be able to do this thing called ‘storytelling’. I had long been in need of some kind of creative, stimulating and

challenging activity but had, so far, not found anything that worked.

In the face of some great professional tellers I felt a bit cheeky thinking that perhaps I could do this. I listened to a story round, and the style of some tellers there made me feel that perhaps I might manage this too. I also had a couple of encouraging conversations with what I think of as ‘ordinary tellers’.

I went home, found the SFS on Google, and was very pleased to discover that there was a local Somerset Group in Langport – just half an hour from my home – and so I turned up for their next session. There I found Sharon Jacksties,

Elaine Mendoza

Jem Dick and Lisa Kenwright who run Mr Rook’s Speakeasy. I had met them all at Halsway.

What a welcoming, open, accepting and empowering group they were. I just listened that evening, and really enjoyed the variety of storytelling styles. Everyone encouraged me to bring a story myself next time.

I went home and got onto Google, and a search for traditional stories with strong female protagonists found me a few simple but engaging stories from all over the world. No pink princesses, handsome princes, marriages or “happily ever after” for me! These were essentially stories prepared for children by American women looking for stories in the early days of the raising of our consciousness in the ’70s. I was to become very pleased when I discovered that many of these stories were new to seasoned tellers in my group!

I returned the next month having ambitiously prepared the first half of ‘The Stolen Bairn’, one to which I was immediately drawn. Too long for me to manage all at once and over the 10-minute guideline anyway. I didn’t make too bad a job of it considering it,

was my first time. Sharon’s gentle comment when I asked her for feedback was, “just keep telling”.

I took this to mean I had a way to go – but there was also some point in me keeping going. The first point I knew – the second was encouraging. I had not made a total fool of myself. I returned the next month with the other half of the story. Looking back, I think now I shall revisit this tale – work it up again and tell it all at once! I hope this re-telling might show that there has been some improvement...

So, for 18 months, I have been telling one story a month. I have also been to several performances by local and national tellers –mainly at Topsham Storytelling in Devon, Dartmoor Storytellers, and Mr Rooks Speakeasy in Frome. Most of these have captivated me. I have found, late in life, the most rewarding and engaging form of entertainment imaginable. It gives me live entertainment that draws me in more than regular theatre. It seems to transport like the movies have always done, but with the addition of a real live person up there taking me with them.

I have also benefited from a day workshop for beginners

with Dartmoor storytellers Lisa Schneidau and Ronnie Conboy, and a weekend for beginners with Sharon Jacksties. These all involved a great balance of challenge and support in taking risks. I learned a lot, gaining a solid sense of myself as a teller from the individual feedback given to us all. I’m looking forward to a follow up weekend sometime.

From just a one hour workshop from Sharon at The Gathering, I gained another dimension on the art of telling. I am at present also considering other development opportunities.

So where to now? I have reached a point where there has to be next steps or I will stand still.

I have started looking beyond a story that I have in a collection to other versions of the same story and beginning to synthesise these. In a small way I am beginning to make the story more my own. I hope to do more of this and to develop the confidence and belief in my ability to do so. I’m not sure my creativity will stretch to working up a fully fleshed-out story from a short paragraph, but you never know. The more I get stories under my skin, the more I might be able to

tackle that.

I need to expand my resources, to think about genres or cultures whose stories I might like to explore and to bring a variety of themes to my tellings.

I know that I need to go to other storytelling groups, so that I can tell my monthly stories to new audiences and develop those early tellings... to risk whether I will remember a story without having worked it up immediately beforehand... to trust that I will find the words as long as I remember the plot. I will have to be prepared to put the effort into travelling further! Then of course there are also the festivals where I could be brave enough to tell to an audience of strangers – which might include professional tellers as well.

I must add that my drawing of this distinction between me, ‘ordinary’ tellers and professional tellers comes entirely from me and reflects my lack of self-belief. So far my sense of the storytelling world is that what matters is this: that people tell. Not ‘how’, ‘where’, ‘when’ or even ‘what’. Each teller has something to offer. I have never met any judgement.

In fact, if anything, I could use

some creative comments!

That brings me to The Gathering in Plymouth. It was interesting to come to this having had no prior involvement with the SFS. I was coming to this community new, to gradually put together a sense of what had been going on in the Society in the past few years. Strange to be arriving at a re-birth with so many who were also there at the near death. I hope the baby thrives and goes on developing.

I did struggle with my lack of experience in the face of what seemed to be a large number of seasoned, professional tellers with history together. I am not great at striking up conversations with strangers, even where there is something in common – though I did get to talk to some people and engage with smaller numbers in workshops.

Maybe something could be included in The Gathering next year that acknowledges these differences and then draws everyone together. However, I take responsibility for my own dilemma. No-one else is responsible for my feelings. I would be the first to encourage others to attend next year – to have the exciting and

stimulating experience of being part of this varied community of tellers, where we all have a place and lots to offer. A place where you will be stimulated, entertained, and as educated as you want to be.

Elaine Mendoza July 2017

Feature:

FEST 2017

– Martin Manasse reports on proceedings at the conference of the Federation of European Storytelling, which took place between 21-24 June at An Grianan, Termonfeckin, Eire.

Wednesday

We arrived hot and sticky from a sauna of a bus ride to be warmly (!) welcomed by the Storytellers of Ireland and their excellent team. An Grianan was a wonderful venue where we were well looked after throughout the conference. Our opening supper was followed by a social evening with pipe and fiddle music, plus the (now traditional) offerings of their own regional food and/or drink that delegates had brought. Country by country we shared thoughts on our midsummer traditions and customs. Then to bed with a full and busy conference day ahead.

Thursday

After a welcome from the FEST Ireland and FEST Executive committees, we had a presentation

from Criostoir Mac Carthaigh, archivist of the National Folklore Collection about the unique and wonderful Irish Schools Collection assembled in the 1930s and providing a massive archive of narrative material collected through the schools. The work continues, but not as intensely as at the beginning.

The next presentation came from Jane O’Hanlon, Education Officer with Poetry Ireland recounting how storytelling came to be included as a vital and significant component of of the Writers in Schools Scheme. I guess that many of us felt rather envious and wished that similar in initiatives had been set up in our own countries.

Then down to the first presentation on the main business of the conference: FEST and its future in the Creative Europe Network. The FEST executive has succeeded in gaining approval for a major networking proposal for FEST in Europe that is potentially worth about 246,000 Euros of EU funding with FEST providing 20%. Later during the conference the scheme would be described in

greater detail and members would bring their own ideas and feedback to the discussion.

This was followed by a valuable address from Katie Lowry of Creative Europe Ireland which described conditions for projects that members might wish to undertake that might attract funds alongside the network.

After lunch, work was started on discussion of the Network strands to be addressed in the first year of the four year project. These were...

Strand 1: Structural development of the storytelling sector

Strand 2: Enhancing the visibility of storytelling as a performing art

Strand 3: Professional development of storytellers

Strand 4: Linking up with other art forms and digital media

Strand 5: Storytelling in other sectors in society

Strand 6: Raise the European dimension of storytelling events and transnational cooperation in the sector

Five discussion groups explored these (strands 1 and 2 were

discussed together) and reported back to the Executive. Then, later in the afternoon, delegates were able to attend two of a list of seven workshops:

1. Gender in Storytelling (Czenge Zalka and Sonia Carmona)

2. Storytelling in Education (Guy Tilkin and Regina Sommer)

3. Storytelling with older people (Liz Weir)

4. Storytelling with new immigrants and refugees (Micaela Sauber and members of the Tellers Without Borders network)

5. Storytelling and popular culture (Czenge Zalka)

6. Building partnerships and working collaboratively (Katie Lowry)

7. Storytelling and translation/ Bi-lingual storytelling with members of APAC (France).

I have heard good things of all the sessions, but was personally involved with session 4 – which I can tell you was very emotional and thought-provoking, as it threw insight into the many sensitivities and techniques required to work effectively in this very vulnerable

sector.

After supper, the day ended with a rich and lively programme of stories and music involving much laughter and tapping of feet, thoroughly raising our spirits.

Friday

We were taken by bus into Ulster where we visited Navan Fort (Emain Macha) in Armagh. A fascinating and informative tour of this highly significant site was preceded by a presentation by the Armagh Rhymers describing the mystery and the myth behind the Mound of Macha.

We then visited St. Patrick’s Cathedral and crypt (fascinating) and the Robinson Library before going on to the Market Place Theatre where we were welcomed by the Lord Mayor and given lunch.

Two presentations followed: an interesting exploration of ‘The Significance of Emain Macha in Landscape and Story’ by Professor Mícheál Ó Mainnín of Queen’s University, Belfast, describing how names became place names or vice versa; and ‘Storytelling in the Process of Conflict Resolution’, given by Dr Derick Wilson of Ulster University and referring

particularly to reconciliation in the wake of the Troubles. This second address had much to say of the role of reconciliation in repairing damaged relationships in society, and creating patterns of behaviour designed to sustain better and more stable relationships for the future.

Finally, we chose one of three workshops to attend:

1. Storytelling and minority languages (Mairin Mhic Lochlainn and Frances Quinn)

2. Tandem Storytelling in Multiple Lnaguages (Abbi Patrix and Senem Donatem)

3. Practical practice in Sweden (Rose Marie Lindfros and Agnes Branting)

It was clear from the enthusiastic feedback reports that all of these were rewarding and well-received. Then back by bus to An Grianan and supper, followed by a joyous, informal gathering that continued until around 2am (I am told – I retired somewhat earlier...).

Saturday

Saturday was a FEST working day. First there were discussions examining different aspects of FEST’s operation (e.g. the Website), and brainstorming ideas to make improvements.

Then after coffee was the annual delegate meeting where, after some quite lengthy discussion, the EU network project and FEST budgets were approved.

Then came the Executive Committee election. After this, a venue for 2020 was selected. Future conferences will be held as follows:

2018 – Slovenia

2019 – “3 countries, 3 cities” –A recognised international region whose primary cities are Aachen (Germany), Liege (Belgium) and Maastricht (Netherlands).

2020 Turkey

Votes of thanks for the work of the Board and Executive Committee, and for the excellent organisation and care from the Irish team and the An Grianan staff, were supported with great enthusiasm.

Then came lunch and, for some,

the return to home – though others travelled to South Armagh to attend further storytelling events.

All-in-all, another excellent FEST conference!

Martin Manasse June 2017

Feature:

The Miracle of Storytelling

– Tony Cooper describes how storytelling saved his life.

My life began with a stutter in 1948. My mother and father lived across the road from where I sit typing this. My father was eccentric and shell-shocked. My mother Nancy and I left to another part of town to live with my grandparents until five years later when Nancy married again, this time to a RAF officer.

With rapid moves to Norfolk, Leeds and Hong Kong, a dozen schools and the associated changes of accent, my chances of finding long-term friends were limited. Family life was constrained because for Nancy I was always a living reminder of my disliked father. But I could read – and I did so omnivorously. Even at the dinner table where books were banned there was the OK Sauce bottle: “OK was used by Andrew Jackson in the American 1840 presidential elections…’

Everywhere we went there

were always libraries, second-hand bookshops and magazines.

Then there were also long rests in hospitals. At eight I contracted meningitis and Nancy looked it up in an ancient medical textbook to find that it was “always fatal”. After six months in Norwich hospital I returned home to find that all my books, toys and clothes had been given away to the Scouts.

At the age of thirteen I spent another six months of enforced rest in a Hong Kong Army hospital recovering from cerebral encephalitis. I breezed carelessly through secondary education enjoying English and Art – believing that, given my medical past, I was not going to be needing qualifications. When the Careers Teacher asked what I was going to do on leaving school I explained that I was probably going to die.

He could not recognise this as a suitable trade – so, when I

mentioned reading, he found me a place at W H Smith’s, the stationers and bookshop.

With what I unconsciously supposed to be a limited life I footled about with a string of unskilled, precarious and dangerous occupations. Life model. Student café cook. Farming. Stuntman. Paris street artist. Landscape gardener. Barman. Cleaner. Pharmaceutical labourer. Screen printer. Pugger for a potter. Hot water-bottle maker. Tool setter. Lifeguard. FE Lecturer in Sport, Leisure and Communication Studies. Marketing manager for a zoo. Art supplies salesman. Toy salesman and puppeteer in Covent Garden, London.

I was working as both a college lecturer and a Covent Garden salesman when my hands and feet went numb. I tried to ignore it by learning close-up magic and threeball juggling but I was eventually diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

I mentioned to another stallholder that I would soon be retiring from active work and he asked what I had done before. I described that long vocational list and he asked how I had managed to get all the jobs. I admitted to a

long sequence of large sweaters to emulate muscles, breezy confidence and downright lies. He was from Afghanistan, he was a storyteller, and he recommended the trade to me. After all, until then my entire working life had been based on fiction.

Later that week, the phone rang – and a voice asked, “Is that Tony Cooper the storyteller?”

“Yes,” I lied.

“This is Bramshill Police Staff Training College at Fleet in Hampshire. We have a slight problem that you may be able to solve. Since last Monday we have been training forty detectives from all over Europe in Colloquial English by a teaching method called Neuro Linguistic Programming. We appear to have caused them to mentally ‘seize up’. They are not speaking, they are drinking and smoking heavily and are dull eyed. Could you take them tomorrow for some English Language entertainment?”

“Yes, certainly.”

I always say ‘yes’. It makes life interesting.

On the train to Fleet I considered the situation. What did the detectives all have in common, coming as they did from

as far afield as Finland and Istanbul? Truth and lies was the answer; a dozen police tales, some true, some urban myths. Using English they should discuss, analyse, and sort the true from the false.

I won 7/3 on that occasion and 6/4 on the next. Being paid £250 a day plus expenses compared favourably with my lecturer’s pay of around £28 per week. I had at last found what I was made for: storytelling.

Storytelling took me through emotional highs and lows, leading me to tell tales in Denmark, France, Great Britain and India to TEFL teachers, Jungian analysts, policemen, colleges, radio listeners, Women’s Institutes, street children, nuclear physicists, prisoners, midwives, college lecturers, school children, businesses, dementia patients, coffee drinkers and passing strangers. I have been paid both pathetic amounts and fortunes, and have been praised, criticised and admired.

And all thanks to a debilitating disease.

Tony Cooper June 2017

The

Cover Story: Waters of Life and Death

– Fiona Collins reflects on the Storytelling for Health Conference in Swansea, 15-17 June 2017.

Conference

Storytelling for

I know I will be reflecting on the gains from my rich experiences at the

Health

for a long time to come. There was a great variety of themes and topics to choose from, and I enjoyed the refreshing mixture of performances, workshops, exhibitions and papers.

Devil’s Violin: Storyteller Daniel Morden (centre) with musicians Oliver Wilson-Dickson (left) and Sarah Moody (right). Photo by Paul Michael Hughes.

I was very sad not to be able to go to everything, and I know that I missed many incredibly worthwhile experiences, simply through the exigencies of the timetable, so I am only able to give a picture of a small proportion of all that was on offer.

I went to presentations on patient stories, stories in mental health, and stories at the end of life. I made a presentation myself on stories with children, about my work as a storyteller at Ysbyty Gwynedd.

Two highlights for me were ‘Stolen’, by Daniel Morden and the Devil’s Violin, and the presentation of Re-Live’s work by Karin Diamond and Alison O’Connor.

I’m in awe of Daniel’s courageous and full-throttle approach to living with cancer. I couldn’t go to hear him speak about his personal journey this time. However, I did go see the premier of ‘Stolen’, performed with The Devil’s Violin master musicians, Oli Wilson-Dickson and Sarah Moody. I was struck above all by the skill with which Daniel wove together traditional motifs to create a sustained and sustaining metaphor of a journey through life-changing illness. I will never

forget the man whose body had been turned to glass and then filled with wasps. Only by drinking the Water of Death could he vanquish the wasps, and then be revived by the Water of Life.

‘Stolen’ will tour in Wales and England from October. More information can be found at www.thedevilsviolin.co.uk

I knew a little about Karin and Alison’s work with Re-Live by reputation, and it was inspiring to see, on film, testimony from the many people who have been enabled to share their own stories by working with Re-Live. To find out more, visit www.re-live.org.uk

I enjoyed the friendly atmosphere, the care and attention to detail shown by organisers Prue Thimbleby, Emily UnderwoodLee and their team, the inspiring keynote speeches – especially from Welsh Assembly AM Eluned Morgan – and the chance to talk about things which are important to us, with friends old and new.

I was impressed in particular by Prue’s energy: she coordinated the conference; created a playful atmosphere, with prizes for travelling far or inspiring people and stickers for learning and using

Welsh; took care of people who were touched too deeply by a subject; chaired three sessions and introduced a multitude of keynote speakers; made all the housekeeping announcements so that everyone knew where they were supposed to be… and when. She even gave a paper to fill the gap when a speaker was unable to attend. It’s clear that her own work in this field is of great value.

My thanks go, also, to two generations of one family: to Steve Killick, who chaired with great sensitivity the session in which I presented, making it possible for a large group to really share their responses and hear each other speak, and to his daughter Ciara, who volunteered throughout the weekend, and supported the chair of the first session I attended by carrying out, with great speed and courtesy, the unenviable task of racing with the microphone to members of the audience who wanted to make a comment from the floor. Da iawn ti!

Here are the most memorable presentations that I attended –but don’t forget, there were many, many more that I just don’t know anything about...

Jess Wilson’s inspiring account of how she discovered, by chance, the power of storytelling to soothe the most savage of beasts in her groundbreaking work as a Forensic Psychiatric Nurse.

Janet Dowling ’s all-powerful retelling of Gilgamesh’s grief at the loss of his friend Enkidu, and the relevance that this 5,000 year old myth has in her work with those who have been bereaved.

David Ambrose’s personal story of having a heart attack – or ‘heart event’ as it is now officially known – which led him to ruminate, in a way that was both light-hearted and open-hearted, on the irony of being an Event Organiser having a Heart Event!

I met old friends and new. We discussed death, life, despair, hope… and stories. We shared laughter, tears, good food and good conversation. And all in what Dylan Thomas, Swansea’s famous son, called “an ugly, lovely town... by the side of a long and splendidcurving shore”.

Who could ask for more?

Fiona Collins

Passing Strange:

The Oddly Pleasing Effect of Stories

The second in what I hope to be an avalanche of anecdotal evidence from storytellers about the life-changing, healing and beneficial results of the storytelling art. – Ed

The Heart of Stories

– by Roisin Murray

Back in the summer of ’97

I decided to “take the plunge” and become a paid storyteller, at least part-time. I was keen to get some experience – which is perhaps why I found myself in a busy shopping mall in a suburb of Manchester having a decidedly rubbish day.

Suffice it to say I wasn’t in the most positive frame of mind by the time I started my fourth and last session of the day. My young audiences were perhaps most kindly described as “challenging”. (I did learn never to leave props within reach of some children or they disappear into Mummy’s shopping bag... I got them back though!)

It was with some lightening of spirit that I launched into the first story of this last session when a young man of around eight years old came around the corner and

froze. He stood completely still, looking down at the floor. When the story finished he edged closer. “What you doing?” he asked in what I interpreted as quite a belligerent tone.

Here we go... I thought. So, mirroring him by looking at the floor, I spoke in a voice with little emotion. “Telling stories.”

“How does that work then?” asked my young tormentor.

“I tell them from my head. If you listen to one you can do one with me,” I grumped back at him, challenging him to have a go.

“Yeah,” was the response.

I was partly stalling for time, as he seemed to be alone and I wanted to see if any parent would put in an appearance. By now an audience was gathering so I couldn’t nip off and find the security guard to take charge of my young interrogator.

Just then, Mum, Dad and younger brother turned the corner – and froze as they saw him talking to me. They called his name and gestured for him to go with them, but he was adamant that he was staying put.

“He has agreed to help me tell a story in a minute, if that is ok?” I explained. They all looked surprised, but nodded their agreement and joined the audience.

The next tale I told was ‘The Tortoise and The Hare’. Primed by me, my new assistant took on the speech of the Tortoise and, of course, won the day and got the applause. After that story he bolted back to join his family and I told several more. All the while he sat, head down but obviously listening.

As the session came to an end the parents came up to me with eyes shining and thanked me for allowing their son to join in. “He never does anything like that,” said his Mum. “He is autistic and rarely interacts with strangers.”

At that time I knew little of Autism, but I realised that the stories had touched something in that young boy. I also admitted to myself that I had made judgments about him which were entirely

wrong. So there were two huge lessons for me in this encounter.

With his parents’ help, the young boy wrote a lovely ‘Thank You’ note in my comments book and I treasure it to this day. I have never forgotten the look on the face of his Mum and Dad as he told his first story – in a noisy shopping mall. I nearly forgot to mention: he signed the message in my comments book “From Jack”.

Roisin Murray June 2017

Review: Surnames, Stockings and Stick Fighting Warriors

a performance by Phil Okwedy and Mikey Price

Reviewed by Cath Little at Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff, 19th May 2017

A child in his mother’s womb sings to his father, and the father remembers the song. The song is sung to us by Mikey Price and Phil Okwedy. Each time we hear it, we understand it more – and the song stays with us long after the show has ended.

This is a show about the big stories and the little stories.

“The waters take you away, the waters bring you back home.”

By sharing the stories of Phil’s family, Phil and Mikey tell our human history too, the tragedy of the Holocaust, the tragedy of Slavery. Phil tells his stories simply with a skilled understatement, an economy of words. He uses repetition like a poet, each time we hear a phrase we understand it a bit more. But how can we tell the story of horror? Phil chooses pictures –the ground glass underfoot, the ancient sign of peace made into a symbol of hate, the writing on the wall, the darkness in the hold of the slave ship. The pictures stand in place of the suffering we think we know about. Phil tells us that, in Igbo, where one thing stands, another stands also. Phil also chooses folktales. He makes the story of how Tortoise tricks the birds resonate powerfully. Because this is a story of the beloved ancestors there is warmth and humour in the telling. There’s excitement and tension too: when Phil describes the battle of the road and his encounter with the stick fighting warriors, it’s as though we’re there with him. And there’s love and fondness when he speaks of the people he has lost. In this show music and song

and word flow together to share the telling of the stories. Mikey Price plays sweet, sad melodies that carry our feelings along like the watery song. Mikey is a skilled musician who plays from the heart, with the Cuatro, Marimbula, Lyre, Sanza, Kalimba, and Adungu. The trust and friendship between Phil and Mikey is real and honest. We are in good company.

Cath Little June 2017

Review:

Welsh Folk Tales

by Peter Stevenson

Reviewed by Cath Little

Peter Stevenson is a storyteller, children’s writer, book illustrator, folklorist, concertina and banjo player, film maker and Crankie maker. He runs Storytelling at Medina (Chwedleua at Medina) and organises the annual three

day

Aberystwyth Storytelling Festival and Y Mabinogi Project in collaboration with Aberystwyth Arts Centre.

Welsh Folk Tales is a “selection of folk tales, true tales, tall tales, myths, gossip, legends and memories”. It celebrates and honours unique Welsh stories. The book is a compendium, a treasury of useful hints. Peter puts himself firmly in the tradition, happiest

when “wandering the old Welsh tramping roads.”

And here he gives us a guidebook for our own journeying. He guides us through Wales on known and unknown routes. Peter loves this land, and wants us to know the stories of what has happened on the land he loves. He also shows the way to submerged cities, lost worlds and utopias, dreams, memories and the Other World.

The story connections he makes are often surprising. Struggles from recent history are retold alongside tales of ancient injustice. Familiar tales are retold alongside obscure, lost, or forgotten stories – stories of Death, Sin-eaters and Vampires alongside tales of Ladies, Lakes and Looking Glasses.

There is a strong sense throughout this book of storytelling as a living tradition. Peter doesn’t just get his stories from books, but from people he meets on his travels around Wales. For him, storytelling is a conversation. He is a great listener and always ready to listen to “anyone happy to tell him a tale and share a cake.” He is also keen to acknowledge a debt of gratitude to the people who wrote the stories down, the story collectors.

He gives us detailed references for the earliest written versions of the stories. He tells us as much as he knows about the story collectors, he draws them, describes their lives and personalities. He has dedicated the book to three of them, to the “three songbirds” Maria Jane Williams from Glynneath Marie Trevelyan from Llantwit Major and Myra Evans from Ceinewydd.

Peter is a gifted visual artist and this book is full of his unique, quirky illustrations. His drawings can be strange and unsettling and are often hauntingly beautiful.

Welsh Folk Tales is a fascinating selection of historical, mythical, personal and traditional stories. As Peter intends, it is a conversation and he gives us a lot to talk about.

Welsh Folk Tales is published by The History Press and available from all good book stores priced at £9.99

Cath Little June 2017

Feature:

Change and Exploration

– Christine Willison presents her keynote speech from this year’s Gathering, 6th May 2017.

How are we changing?

The SFS has undergone many changes. We are a community of people who love stories. Couldn’t be simpler you’d think.

Well to manage such an amorphous group and to provide a society which links us all has been quite a task, as you’ve all heard from trustees at the AGM. But what sets us out as unique is our ability to change. Moving from Bob Cratchett and his quill pen to the digital age, whilst retaining our integrity and friendship.

Its been a stormy sea. We have lurched from problem to success to problem and again success, but thanks to a stalwart team we have ticked off some of the improvements which Carl Gough helped us to recognise in a session in Reading last year.

One of the lessons to be learnt is that, with a small team, nothing

happens overnight – and frequently the slow pace of committee movement places safeguards or lifebelts along the way.

Thanks to a great crew of dedicated volunteers and trustees we have a social media presence, as well as a stupendous website which at last does everything bar make the tea – and we are working on that.

We will continue to change.

Christine Willison

Change is important – but we need to change in a way that brings our existing members sailing along with us, whilst appealing to new people.

Exploration

We have explored new places, we have explored new themes and charted new territories, we are planning for the future creatively.

We have ideas on the table for theming National Storytelling week, for mentoring new storytellers young and old, for ensuring that the world and his wife have a greater understanding of the oral tradition. With our newly emerging marketing strategy we will be popping up all over the media.

But first things first. What do we mean by ‘storytelling’? It’s a term used by writers, filmmakers, journalists, actors, puppeteers, poets, readers and others who use story to promote their art.

All of these are valid, but the Cinderella of the art form is the traditional oral storyteller. No script, no props, no cameras, no books, no pen and paper are required. Just a comfy place to sit and a glass of water and the magic

of “Once Upon a Time”.

Many of us have sat down in cafés and pubs sometimes on the town square and started with “Once Upon a Time”. Its a signal. Sit down, get comfy, listen. There’s nothing quite like it.

Let us not lose sight of the basics of storytelling – the very life of the artform is the lifeblood of our planet. Without Earth, Wind, Fire and Water we could not sustain life. Nor could our stories. Even simple tales like The Three Little Pigs contain the elements within them.

Let’s explore language.

I hope that some people had a chance to get to the Gathering workshop with Diane Mullis. Who gave us an insight into the use of textiles in story.

A story is woven like cloth, it’s knitted together – a yarn is spun, its thread or line can mesmerise, transport and empower its audience. We embroider text with metaphor, with colour, with drama. Textiles form the warp and weft of our thoughts. In ‘Imagination’ we find spin (a yarn) and fustian, a coarse cloth. Silken words will woo the listener. The wide boy will have the whole thing sewn up. Text began as a loom of interwoven

threads. Social structures also draw on textiles, with ‘tweedy’, ‘woollen’, ‘home-spun’ and ‘russet’, describing rustic, rude or ignorant characters; ‘chintzy’, a term for the suburban petit bourgeois. At this Gathering we have a patchwork of stories and story-related experiences.

Victoria Mitchell says “in the Andes the language itself – Quechua – is a chord of twisted straw, two people making love, different fibres united”, and that the Hungarian word for ‘fibres’ is the same as that for vocal chords. “These fragile references suggest for textiles a kind of speaking and for language a form of making.” We can see textiles’ strong affinity with song in the characteristic of patterns they both share.

Further thoughts for your research.

Professor Janis Jefferies has researched the correspondences between patterns found in weaving and those found in traditional polyphonic songs. Like individual threads, the individual voices each are contributing to a textural and harmonic whole – whether physical patterned cloth, or melodic, textured sounds.

There are many, many metaphors from weaving and spinning. Textiles also form the warp and weft of our thought and expression.

Willison May 2017

Christine

Aiming for Gold

– Tony Cooper’s forthcoming publication, Tale Bones , will explore how the essence of a story can remain intact despite changing variables such as geography and historical context. In this excerpt, he demonstrates by transposing a Sufi fable into the age of the firearm...

The Jewish soldier was tired, dusty and weary. His beard was untrimmed and his hair was lank; his uniform was faded and patched – but the one thing that gleamed in the warm light of the setting sun was his gun. The rifle had saved his life more than a dozen times, and with it he had won shooting competitions – from Sweden in the North to Constantinople in the South. He would eventually hang this faithful weapon above his fireplace in his father’s cottage, but for now he would enjoy a glass of ale in his local alehouse.

As he approached, his eye was drawn to the wooden wall of the alehouse. There were three new decorations where there had been nothing but bare planks when he had joined the army so many years ago. Three targets had been painted there, and – although they were of different sizes – they all shared the same design: an outer ring of black surrounding a ring of white, inside that another ring of red, then a final blue ring encircling a bull’s eye of gold.

Yet there was more. There, right in the very centre of each target: a neat bullet hole.

Who could have fired those shots? What kind of rifle could fire that accurately? Who could load a charge into a cartridge so evenly? Who would have the steady hand, not once but three times? And what of the crosswind the blew incessantly up and down the gorge? Even he, as the champion shot of the Polish Army, would be hard pressed to score those shots at any

distance. He decided that he would ask in the alehouse.

Inside, he was met by old friends, who bought him many mugs of beer. His back became sore from being slapped in greeting.

As the bar closed, he asked the landlord about the three targets. The landlord said they had appeared over one Easter weekend, but nobody had seen the painter or heard any shots fired. But he had to admit that just about everyone in the village had been drunk for most of those three days.

Despite extensive questioning over the next two weeks, locals revealed no memories of a visiting marksman. He had to return to his regiment soon without finding who had fired the incredibly accurate shots.

The day that he was due to leave, he was slumped over the table in the alehouse – feeling hungover and looking miserable – when the pot-boy laid a hand on is shoulder and asked what it was that troubled him.

“Those damned targets. I must know who fired those shots and hit the bull’s eye every time, or I shall never sleep again!”

“Well, Sir, will you promise not

to be angry with me if I tell you who fired those shots?”

“Angry? Why should I be angry with you?”

“Because, Sir – and you must never tell my father this – I fired those shots from my father’s hunting rifle, while the the rest of the village were in church and the bells rang out.”

“You!? You fired those three shots from across the gorge? But you are no older than eleven summers, you were not even born when I left to join the Army! How could a boy like you get those shots right into the centre of each target?”

“Easily, sir. I fired the shots first, then painted the targets around them.”

In the Sufi telling of this tale, the rifle was a bow and the bullets were arrows. The original was told to me by Del Reid of Pinner in London, who was chair of the Society for Storytelling at the time.

Tony Cooper

Rifle image by Mr.Advert, CC BY-SA 4.0

See commons.wikimedia.org

The continues...

torylines

New articles of Storylines are available instantly at www.sfs.org.uk to members of the SFS. To become a member, visit www.sfs.org.uk or phone 01939 235 500.

To submit an article or review, or to advertise in this magazine, contact the editor, Tony Cooper, on storylines@sfs.org.uk

The next edition of this magazine will be available from January 2018