Coming Home to Story

Last night I went back to see Jez Butterworth’s play Jerusalem for the second time. As before, Mark Rylance’s bravura performance as the atavistic Englishman Johnny “Rooster” Byron took my breath away but something else – much deeper – had drawn me back. The whole substance and tenor of the play challenged me to acknowledge my Englishness and to recognise my own complicity in too-readily surrendering the precious roots of that unique identity.

I found myself agreeing with Paul Kingsnorth (whose book Real England: The Battle Against the Bland influenced both Mark Rylance and Jez Butterworth) who wrote in his programme note: “The English, notoriously, have a blind spot when it comes to their myths, the legends of their past and their people, their folk tales and their origins.” It seems to me that for many of us in England, our memory and imagination have become detached from both our history and our land, thereby losing any real sense of where we have come from and where we belong.

I have no desire to be a Little Englander. Indeed, I pride myself on being a widely-travelled, well-informed person capable of embracing global issues and planetary concerns. But on reflection I wonder whether it is possible truly to be a citizen of the world unless one is first and foremost secure in a more local identity. It is hard to care for the planet in anything other than an abstract way if you are not rooted somewhere on the earth.

In the dim and distant past, some of my ancestors came to these islands as Viking invaders (I know this from a genetic quirk that affects the tendons in my hands). My surname Mead probably derives from the pre-7th century native word moed meaning meadow. There is no obvious trace of either Celtic or Norman hereditary in my family history.  It seems pretty certain that I came out of that Anglo-Saxon-Norse melting pot that we now call the English and I have to admit that I am sorely out of touch with my own oral tradition.

I greatly admire the work of storyteller Hugh Lupton (and others like Nick Hennessy) who are reclaiming and bringing new life to old English stories such as Wayland the Smith and Robin Hood, but I am still searching for the native stories that are particularly mine to tell. I ask myself what is distinctive about being an English storyteller and then it occurs to me that I should rather be addressing that question to the old pagan gods and goddesses of this once thickly-forested, magic-infused, and richly-storied landscape: those same gods and goddesses to whom Johnny “Rooster” Byron turns for succour in the closing scenes of Jerusalem.

It is a truism amongst storytellers that the stories they tell only come to life (or not) in the hearts and imaginations of the audience. The storyteller’s job is to tell their tales with such conviction, feeling, and detail that their listeners experience them as real. But how can we know what is going on inside another person?

Usually the clues are subtle and we look for them in the expressions on the faces of the audience, the way they are holding their bodies, and the quality of their attention. Sometimes we get more direct feedback after a performance, when people tell us about the emotions they felt or describe the images that came up for them during a particular story.

The image at the top of this post comes from one of those very rare occasions when we get something more. It is a sketch made by artist Maxine Relton as she listened to a performance of The Storyteller’s Tale that I gave a couple of weeks ago at the Rabley Drawing Gallery in aid of a charity supporting members of the Indian Puppet Maker’s Guild.

It is a romantic tale full of action, drama and powerful imagery. My friend Shanee Taylor accompanied me on the Tampura and sang several songs she had composed based on Indian ragas. It was a magical evening: the story took off and seemed to transport us all – teller and listeners alike – back to 18th century India.

Maxine’s sketch amalgamates phrases and images from the story with details of the instruments and dress of the storyteller and musician. It is a visual artist’s response to both the story and to the art of storytelling: a combination of the inner and outer worlds of the performance that goes far beyond mere illustration.

How satisfying it is when one art form enters into dialogue with another!

I’ve been musing recently on what it’s all about. I mean, what is the point of running around giving performances, writing books and articles, injecting a bit of storytelling into various leadership programmes? What difference does any of it make?  The world is going to hell in a handcart and I spend my time trying to persuade people that they should spend more time telling and listening to stories!

But in the midst of this despair and self-pity, I recall that two men who have inspired me in different ways have both died within the past few weeks. My personal acquaintance with each was slight. The first was archetypal psychologist James Hillman; the second was singer-songwriter Jackie Leven. Both men poured their lives into their work. They too may have wondered occasionally what it was all about but that didn’t stop them writing or making music.

I met James a decade ago when he hosted an intimate conversation about Shakespeare’s Tempest. His opening remark still rings in my ears: “Let us consider what constitutes right conduct when the ship is going down?” I no longer recall the detail of what followed but I do remember his passionate energy and iconoclastic questioning of our comfortable assumptions about the ways of the world. He was already in his mid-seventies and I still look to him as a role-model for male elderhood.

Jackie was a fellow participant in a Wild Dance event for men in the 1990s. It was my first exposure to any kind of “menswork” and I was frankly terrified. Jackie took me under his wing that day and listened appreciatively as I spoke about feeling that I had spent much of my life hiding the fire in my belly. He listened and he challenged me to stop hiding it; he was close behind me as I symbolically stood in front of the whole group and unveiled the light from a torch (a borrowed bicycle lamp as I remember) from under my clothing and claimed my place as a man among men.

So I have particular reasons to be grateful to both men who touched my life in ways that were highly significant for me but probably unknown to them. They were simply being themselves and doing their work. They left their mark in a myriad of unintended and unexpected ways. The world is richer for their lives and poorer for their passing. I salute them and give thanks.

In lighting a candle for each of them I am reminded of a saying of Confucius: “It is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.”  Then I think back to where this post began and I realise that is what it’s all about.

In 1970, when an oxygen tank exploded on board Apollo 13 and the spacecraft began to leak, Commander Jim Lovell had someone back on earth to turn to for help. Within hours, NASA had gathered together a “tiger team” of astronauts and scientists at Mission Control to come up with a solution for the problem. They succeeded and thanks to their efforts the crew of Apollo 13 returned home safely.

It is a great story of human ingenuity, endeavour and courage. Just the kind of story you might think we need to hear as we look forward to an uncertain future.  But I’m not so sure. Today the whole planet has a problem but there is no Houston, no Mission Control, no-one else to turn to who is not already on board. If we are going to find ways of creating a sustainable future then we have to do so ourselves.

Perhaps we need different kinds of stories to inspire us now.

My first book Coming Home to Story: Storytelling Beyond Happily Ever After was published on 1st November by Vala Publishing and I’m still basking in the huge pleasure of launching it at parties in Bristol, Edinburgh and London. It was absolutely amazing to see so many friends and supporters – and good to practise my handwriting, signing books.

Here is a picture of it on the bookstand for the first time at the Scottish International Storytelling Festival in Edinburgh last month (it’s the grey and silver hardback in the middle of the picture). Click on the image for a gallery of photographs from the London launch.

I’m still getting used to the idea that people are actually reading my words. It took me three years to write the book and it seems to be taking people three days to read it. Is the 365:1 writing/reading ratio par for the course, I wonder?

What is the book about? I would say that it is about the journey towards being and becoming a storyteller. It is a personal story of finding and responding to a calling that came late in life but it also makes a case for the vital role of stories, storytelling and storytellers in the re-enchantment of the modern world. Of course, while I was writing it I could decide what I thought it was all about. Now that it is out there somewhere I have to get used to the fact that what really matters is what other people make of it.

The publisher’s blurb says:

Coming Home to Story tells of the magic of stories and storytelling, and their power to liberate the human spirit. Master Storyteller Geoff Mead takes the reader inside the experience of telling and listening to stories. He shows how stories and storytelling engage our imaginations, heal communities, and bring adventure and passion into our lives.

Master Storyteller, eh? Now there’s something to try to live up to.

If you would like to read more about the book or buy a copy click on the Vala logo below.