The Society for Storytelling is currently in the midst of running its annual ‘National Story Telling Week’.
This initiative is in its tenth year, and was set up to promote the ancient art of storytelling, an art that the society believes to be ‘at the root of every artform: we think in story form, make sense of our world in narrative - from something we’ve seen – from last night’s television, to what family and folk stories we remember and retell.’
A statement I would have immense difficulty arguing with. So I am not going to try.
I love story telling, I suppose as a parent it is something that a lot of us do naturally, but generally to a very small audience – in both a figurative and literal sense.
Children, certainly in my experience, seem to thrive on being read to, well, at the very least, it does often shut them up.
It was quite something to discover, from such an early age, how children will sit and be transfixed at storytelling time, much before logic or reason seems to be applicable. Even babies with picture, and touch-and-feel books, getting the hump when you actually stop reading the narrative to them.
Storytelling is so rewarding for both teller and listener, on a certain level, I am not enjoying my son learning to read, as it eats into my ‘stage time’ with him, not that I am about to embark on a career as a dramatic storyteller.
I anticipate it will be a long time before I actually cease reading to my five-year-old, if ever, and in fact, I can look forward to him expanding his reading to me. It is seemingly something much rarely for adults to actually enjoy listening to the art of storytelling.
However the Society for Storytelling has a library of storytellers, people who can provide you with engaging, dramatic readings.
They also list on-line resources, where you can go to listen to stories being told, and only this morning we were directed to the magic library of Mrs P, a wonderful resource of classic stories being retold in a very cosy environment.
One of our new favourite bloggers, The Book Chook has also written an excellent blog post about National Storytelling week, all the way from Australia. You will find masses of links and information there.
Details of this year’s National Storytelling Week are available here, and we hope that you find something interesting going on by you.
We would love to hear of anything you get up to.
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