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Bath and North East Somerset Libraries

Interview With Mendip Storytelling Circle


What methods do you use that you find particularly popular when delivering Storytelling?

It depends on the audience. Stories are about our humanity and life experiences, so engaging in a way that relates is important.  For children there may be music, puppets, and creative processes to develop spontaneous storytelling.

A few practical tips from Mendip Story Circle:

Start any story with a “hook”: a phrase or word that both engages the audience and marks that what follows is a story.

Keep the language simple and natural unless the storyteller is an expert in their subject matter (such as using dialect or Chaucer’s Middle English).

Using a warm, conversational tone in intimate settings, but a more “theatrical” style in the open air or large gatherings.

It is interesting to note that tellers use a variety of successful performance methods, ranging from a performer who will just sit in a chair to tell a story as if they are beside a fire on a cold winter’s evening, through to one who acts out the parts, rushing about the stage, throwing their arms about and at times shouting!

How can we engage modern audiences with Storytelling?

Storytelling, told, not read, is for all times and ages.

Everyone engages with a good story, whether when reading a novel or short story, watching/listening to Drama on the radio or TV, or even attending Pantomime. Perhaps we need to present “storytelling” as something familiar and therefore unthreatening. Something they already do without realising it.

Bringing people together for oral storytelling is like sitting around a camp fire. There is a sense of community and each individual is part of the story through their own senses/imagination.

Engaging with the audience is essential. You need a good story, confident presentation and to speak clearly at a volume that can be heard at the back of the room without shouting. Sometimes a bit of “banter” or encouraging “audience participation” helps!

How do you convey emotions in Storytelling?

 Through facial or bodily expression and gestures, silences, choice of words, tone of voice, letting a sentence or phrase “hang” without completing, imagery. Lots of ways!

Is there anyone that you can recommend to the Bath & NES customers to seek out?

When we are allowed again ….. Mendip Storytelling Circle. It’s a wonderful, friendly evening.

Why should people engage with Storytelling rather than watching TV?!

The two are not mutually exclusive. However, TV is “passive” whereas storytelling is “participatory.” You bring your own imagination to the encounter. And as the adage goes: the pictures (in your head) are better. Everyone knows that you CANNOT beat a live performance.


This interview was conducted for Storytelling Week 2021.