“After nourishment, shelter and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world.”
― Philip Pullman
I am a storyteller based in London.
I co-run run the North London Traditional Storytelling Circle.
I tell stories in schools, libraries, at festivals and at many different and diverse venues and for a variety of different occasions. I facilitate workshops on personal and professional development using story; and I work with individuals who wish to explore story as an aid to facilitating environmental and social change.
I first discovered stories…
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as we all do, in my childhood. I suffered a terrible loss, which I feared I would never recover from, when I had to fully acknowledge that Narnia, the magical world invented by C. S Lewis didn’t really exist. Since then it seems that my path has been a long and winding journey back to an understanding that the world of myth, fairy tale and fantasy do exist, but in a very special way. And that they are absolutely essential in making sense of our experience in this complex world of ours.
I worked in the field of mental health and personal development for several decades as an art therapist, group therapist and psychoanalytic psychotherapist. I also taught Raqs Sharqi, a graceful and earthy form of dance from Egypt for nearly 30 years. In my teens and early twenties I wrote songs and toured as a singer-songwriter. I was lucky enough to be the support act for a time for the wonderful and long lived folk rock band, Steeleye Span.
As an art therapist I worked for a decade in the NHS also in Social Services and at the University of Hertfordshire, training art therapists. I trained at the Institute of Group Analysis in the 90’s and have been a professional member of that organisation The IGA, ever since. I have worked with individuals, groups, work teams and organisations.
My most recent education has been received at the inspirational, International School of Storytelling based at Emerson College, Forest Row, Sussex. I completed The Heart and Craft of The Storyteller course there in 2014.
Telling traditional stories is my passion and sharing them is a great joy!
We are all storytelling creatures. Often in this busy pressured world we rely on television or films for our stories and no longer have the pleasure of being told a story, person to person, or the pleasure of telling one. I hope you will get a sense through my website and blog of the riches of storytelling and how important stories and storytelling can be to us as individuals and as a society.
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