Timeless Tales collected from Syrian refugees (book review)

I first heard about this book at the Federation for European Storytelling conference in Greece this summer, from Jack Lynch, the Irish storyteller who revised the English translation. It immediately grabbed my attention - we spent a lot of time at the conference talking about the refugee situation.

Timeless Tales is the result of a joint project between the Swedish Cultural Heritage without Borders, Fabula Storytelling, and members of the the Hakaya network (Arab Education Forum, Al Barad theatre, Arab Resource Collective for Popular Arts - Al Jana). In 2014, Syrian researchers gathered more than 250 folktales from displaced people in refugee camps in Syria and Lebanon. They selected and transcribed 21 of them, and published them in January 2015 in a high quality, English-Arabic bilingual book.
This was the book that showed up in my mailbox two weeks ago, courtesy of Peter Hagberg from Fabula Storytelling. I was going to save it for my A to Z Challenge theme in April, but recent events made it very timely, so I decided to talk about it today.

UPDATE: The book can be downloaded in a free PDF from this website.

In addition to being a very important project for the preservation of intangible cultural heritage, this book is also a very enjoyable read. It is shorter than it looks - the English half amounts to about 95 pages, with illustrations in-between - but it is very well organized. Each story is marked with the name, age, city of origin and current residence of its teller, often with footnotes explaining where the city is, and what kind of a region it belongs to. Additional notes explain names and cultural terms. The translators and editors even noted where the tales have been altered from their original format (this is how you know the book was created by professional storytellers).

The tales themselves are delightful, and run a wide range of genres. There are tricksters, wise fools, tragic lovers, man-eating ogres (which seems to be the generic term the translators used for ghouls), wise women, just kings, and camels that lay golden eggs (and then marry princesses). Some of the stories will ring familiar - there is a version of Love Like Salt, two different versions of the Animal Husband (one with a camel and one with a horse's head - this latter takes the cake in the category of "unlikely"). There is even a variation of the Three Little Pigs (without pigs, but with the addition of a ghoul). All the tales carry nuggets of wisdom and good advice - one of them is a very well-known inspirational story that has been making the rounds on the Internet, but the rest read like classic folklore.
I especially liked the stories that involved women in difficult family situations - one getting away from an abusive home by wit and luck, one saving her daughters from the jaws of a ghoul, and one giving advice to her husband on how to become wealthy. There is even a story in here about how a husband's own distrust and meanness turns his wives to erratic behavior (which he blames them for, until his own fault is pointed out). While not all the tales are kind to women, they have clearly been selected with a professional storyteller's eye to what would appeal to wider, contemporary audiences.

In the end, I was kind of sad that out of the 250 collected stories, only 21 made it into the collection - I hope to hear or read more of them in the future.

The illustrations are pretty and fun, and the entire layout of the book is clear, professional, and visually pleasing. All in all, the volume does justice to the tales, and to the people who tell them. I would like to quote the closing thoughts of its preface:

"Stories are what we are made of, and if we lose our stories we risk losing touch with our humanity and our identity. We strongly believe that through the enhancement of this thousand-year-old heritage of storytelling the Hakawati project has a potential to bridge ethnic, political and religious divides and hopefully build better understanding between people."

Strongly recommended read for all storytellers, story-loving people, and people following the news on the refugee debate.

Story Saturday: What does YOUR Cinderella look like?

This is an intriguing little thing that has been rattling around in my head lately. Every time I open Facebook, there is a high chance I'll run into one of those "Disney princesses reimagined as..." memes.
In case you have missed this trend, here are some things Snow White & Co. have been re-drawn as lately:

Iconic horror movie villains
Real people
Famous people
Wearing historically accurate costumes
Having realistic hair
Characters from the Walking Dead
Velociraptors
Warriors
Hipsters
Tattoo pin-up girls
Men
Different races/cultures
Fine arts portraits
Having short hair
Each other
Twisted creatures
Pop culture heroines
College students
And finally, the ultimate spoof of the trend:
Lukewarm bowls of water

The visual cues people most often associate with folk- and fairy tale characters tend to come from illustrations they see as children. This and the memes above (especially the ones that play around with the appearance of the princesses) made me wonder how much of our mental imagery is influenced by Disney. I am not one of those storytellers who scream about the death of imagination every time someone mentions the D word... but when I ask myself how I pictured these folk- and fairy tale characters before I saw the canon Disney imagery, I have some very interesting realizations.

My Little Mermaid has never been a redhead. I grew up with the Japanese cartoon instead of the Disney one (which I didn't see until college), so the Little Mermaid in my head has always been blonde (oh, and her name was Marina and she didn't wear a bra).

Talking about blondes: My Cinderella has always been a brunette. I don't remember where I got that idea; she just always sounded like a brunette to me. I also imagined her as very tiny. The dresses, however, I very clearly remember coming from a Hungarian picture book. There were three of them (duh), one pink, one blue, and one green and gold.
Some of my other iconic early fairy tale images came from the same book series. The princess of the Frog King was blonde, round-faced and curly-haired; the Nixie in the millpond was black-haired and rosy cheeked.

My Sleeping Beauty, on the other hand, was definitely a redhead (kind of a dark, coppery red) with freckles. I usually imagined her in a matching yellow dress. Since in Hungarian, her name is Csipkerózsika (Little Briar Rose), I always imagined her castle as tangled in thorny vines, but also covered in pale pink dog-rose flowers.

Snow White is pretty much a given, except in my head she has a long black braid, and doesn't wear yellow-and-blue.

Images definitely get more random once we get to stories that have never really been put to the iconic big screen. But now I am wondering: How many children get to make their own mental images of these classic characters before popular media teaches them what they should look like?

So here is the question:

Do you remember any folk- or fairy tale characters that lived in your head before you saw canonized pictures of them? What did they look like? Why did you like imagining them like that?

I would love to hear from you! :)

Story Saturday: Tale of Tales (Film Review)

And THIS is how you do a fairy tale adaptation.
Or three.

Tale of Tales (Il racconto dei racconti) is an Italian-French-British film based on stories from Giambattista Basile's 1634 fairy tale collection, the Pentamerone. It is categorized as "fantasy-horror" - which is pretty much the same as saying "fairy tale adaptation."
The movie re-tells and intertwines three stories from the collection:
The Flea (one of my favorites)
The Enchanted Doe (a version of "the golden-haired twins")
The Old Woman Discovered (which was new for me although I do know the story type)

I have a personal connection to the Pentamerone: When I first started working as a storyteller, these fairy tales were a huge part of my repertoire (since I performed with a Renaissance group). Ever since I first saw the trailer, I have been waiting with excitement to see the film:

I was not disappointed.

First off, in good European film fashion, this movie pulls no punches. There is no fake prudishness, no sugarcoating, and while everything you see on seen is gorgeous, nothing is ever "pretty" or neat. The film has the surreal, unreal, startling beauty of fairy tales; it visually represents the elaborate, flowery language of Basile's stories, while revealing the darkness that operates their plot.

And there is definitely darkness. I knew all three stories before I saw the movie; I knew what was supposed to happen, but I kept wondering if they would actually go there. 

They did, and then some.

(Mild spoiler-ish things ahead)

I was surprised at how strong the emotional reactions were that this film got out of me at every turn. I was literally biting my nails (or rather, my fist). They took the fairy tale stories, and added the raw emotions to every character - what would a princess feel when she is given away to a stranger as a wife? What would a queen behave like when she gets a child after years of longing? What would a woman feel when her sister leaves her behind? The emotional roller-coaster takes us through all that and more, from horrible fight to tearful relief to bitter pity. The whole thing is wonderfully constructed, exciting - and emotionally exhausting in a good way.

The acting is stellar. Bebe Cave, in the role of The Flea's Princess Violet, deserves an array of awards for her work. She had moments that I had to replay multiple times. Shirley Henderson (whom I didn't even recognize until I looked at the credits) brings a heartbreaking performance. Salma Hayek is a perfect queen, and Toby Jones is everything a slightly crazy fairy tale king needs to be.

Even more important than this: The creators understood fairy tales. They knew that they have not endured for hundreds of years because of the dresses, sunshine, and cuteness (*cough*LiveActionCinderella*cough*). They were not afraid to go into the emotions behind the symbols, while still keeping the magic intact. And as they did, they managed to open up new ways of understanding these stories - they turned envy to longing, desire to greed, desperation to power (you'll get it when you see it). The movie is an exercise in doing the "what if" kind of fairy-tale re-tellings with grace, empathy, and subtlety. 

This movie is probably the best fairy tale adaptation I have seen in a very long time.

A to Z Challenge Early Theme Special: Do you know any good folktale collections?

This is a Story Saturday post, in which I reveal my 2016 A to Z Challenge theme early,
AND ask for your input.

I have been getting increasingly frustrated about folktale collections.
It's not them, it's me.

I spend a lot of time reading book blogs, following book tweets, and procrastinating on Goodreads. It didn't take long to figure it out that my reading activities fall into a very narrow niche: I love to read traditional stories. I get incredibly excited about upcoming folktale collections, and I go to great lengths to track down the ones that are hard to find. I have quite a few favorites, but I am always on the lookout for more - especially from cultures that I am not very familiar with.

And herein lies the problem:
Folktale collections get very little publicity, and almost no excitement.

Yeah yeah, I know, there are many storytellers and story-lovers out there who share my feelings. But let's face it: Compared to the hype around YA fiction and supernatural romance (for instance), "folktale collections" is not exactly a hopping topic.

But they should be!

In order to promote reading folktales, exploring other cultures, and dusting off some little known volumes full of magic, my 2016 theme for April A to Z will be:

BADASS FOLKTALE COLLECTIONS

Here is the plan:

1. I want to read a folktale collection for every letter of the alphabet.
2. I want all the books I read to be new for me too (otherwise, where is the fun?)
3. I want the collections to represent as many different cultures and traditions as possible.
4. I want as many as possible to be new or recent editions, raising awareness of the genre and its latest developments.

5. I want to write all my A to Z posts as if I was pitching these books to a wider audience. I want to write posts that highlight all that is exciting, unique, and magical about them. I want to make people want to read them, discover new tales, new worlds to get lost in, and broaden their horizons way beyond the "classics." (If I see one more Cinderella/Snow White/Riding Hood adaptation, I'll scream).

And here is where I need your help.

If you know of any good folktale collections recently published (in the past 1-2 years) or coming out soon (before April 2016), let me know here in the comments, on Twitter, or through my website. I can't promise to fit all suggestions into the final list, but I would nevertheless like to hear about as many as possible! (Yes, it is okay to suggest your own work!)
(I am also happy to read in Spanish)
*Note* If it's your own work, you don't actually have to send me copies. I am happy if you do, but I am also happy to support publishing by buying the books that make the final list.
*Second note* I am probably going to post a full list of the suggested books, regardless of whether they are on the A to Z list.

Let the reading commence!
#ReadFolktales

Story Saturday: 5 Masculine Heroes Who Dressed Up As Women

Today we interrupt our regularly scheduled program of the Dietrich Cycle, to bring you the latest season of Mythology Drag Race.

Thor
One of the most fun stories to tell to any age group, the Þrymskviða tells the story of Thor's hammer Mjöllnir being stolen by the giant Thrym. He asks for the goddess Freya in exchange for the weapon, and she (dis)respectfully declines. Thor decides to take her place and dress up as a bride, with Loki as his maid, and they manage to fool the giant through the entire wedding, until the hammer is returned. Thor almost manages to give himself away by eating too much, and glaring at the giants, but Loki seems to be enjoying himself. 
(Of course it was Loki's idea.)

Hercules
At some point in his career, Herc also got a taste of women's clothing, although not exactly by his own free will. Serving as a slave to Queen (or, according to some other sources, Goddess) Omphale, he spent a year switching roles with the lady - Omphale wore Hercules' lion skin, and the hero wore a woman's dress, doing women's chores around the house. While not voluntary, apparently the change did not leave a scar on his pride - once freed from the one-year contract, he ended up marrying Omphale, and fathering some legendary children.

Achilles
(Because who wouldn't want to see Brad Pitt in drag?)
In a famous prequel to the whole Troy shebang, Achilles lived disguised as a girl for a while. Since the prophecy said he would die young, his mother tried to keep him away from fighting by dressing him as a girl, and sending him to live with the daughters of the king of Skyros, a tiny island. Achilles lived under the name of Pyrrha (Redhead), until Odysseus found out where he was hiding, and came to recruit him for the war effort. He brought jewelry and gifts for all the girls, and some weapons; then he pretended the island was under attack, and at the sound of the horns Achilles grabbed up a sword and thus gave himself away.
Story also says that while there, he fathered two sons with one of the actual daughters of the king. I am sure the girls didn't mind the dress.

Hugdieterich
I already wrote about this in my post on love stories from the Dietrich Cycle. Hugdieterich, emperor of Constantinople, not only dressed himself as a princess to get close to the love of his life, but even learned womanly arts like embroidery, in order to impress her father. She spent some time at court teaching the girls womanly arts, before giving away who he was (and fathering some heroic sons). Story doesn't tell if he kept his hobby of embroidery later on.

Arjuna
The leader of the legendary Pandava brothers of Indian mythology, the great and mighty hero Arjuna also spent a year in women's clothing (cursed into an eunuch by a woman whose advances he turned down). He took on the name Brihannala, and taught dancing and singing to a princess. He was later (after changing back) offered the hand of the princess, but declined, saying that he saw her as a student and a daughter. Princess ended up marrying his son instead.

Case in point: Wearing feminine clothing does not tarnish your chances at manly immortality.

One question remains: Who wore it best?

Story Saturday: The king that breathes fire, and other badasses (Exploring the Dietrich cycle, V.)

Now that I have been all over Dwarves and mountains, it feels like it is time to introduce some of the human heroes of the Dietrich cycle - specifically, the ones that will make an appearance in the storytelling show.
There is quite a few of them, so for today, I am focusing on the first three in order of appearance:

King Dietrich of Bern

Since he is less well known than Arthur, here is the gist: Dietrich is described as a tall and strong man (naturally), with fair hair that falls to his shoulders in "heavy curls." He is not exceedingly handsome, but he does have the redeeming quality of being able to breathe fire when angry (who wouldn't want that in a man). His shield shows a golden lion in a read field, reaching up towards a golden crown. He has two excellent, Dwarf-made swords, the first one (which he gives away) is called Nagelring, the second one (which he wins in an epic blind fight) is called Eckesachs (Ekkisax). Dietrich is heroic, brave, just, boisterous, generous, and all those other things a king needs to be. Sometimes he makes mistakes.

Fun fact: At one point early in his adventures, Dietrich is thrown into a pit full of venomous snakes. By the time Hildebrand comes to rescue him, young Dietrich has already eaten some of the adders.
(Take that, Ragnar Lodbrok)

Hildebrand

If we are drawing comparisons, Hildebrand is Dietrich's Merlin - with no magic, and infinitely more badassery. Think Ser Barristan Selmy. He is a famous swordsman who is hired to be Dietrich's mentor when the boy is only five years old - so begins a life of friendship and shared adventures. From the very first quest of Dietrich (where they kill two giants), master and pupil fight side by side, and Hildebrand holds his own very well against multiple enemies, even when he is past his 100th birthday. Despite his prowess in battle (and literally being named "battle sword"), Hildebrand is the wiser and more level-headed of the two, often helping Dietrich with diplomatic advice, and jumping in front of him when he is about to do something stupid.
Hildebrand has a beloved and wise wife (the Lady Ute) and a brave son, Hadubrand. He is the lord of Castle Garden, and as such, his device is a white castle and golden flowers on a red field.

Fun fact: Hildebrand gets his own story (called the Hildebrandslied) in which he returns home from 32 years of exile, and has to fight his own son who doesn't recognize him. In earlier versions of the story, he ends up killing Hadubrand; in later versions, they recognize each other in time. People love a happy ending.

Sistram

Doubtless my favorite knight of the bunch, Sistram is really no one special - and yet endlessly entertaining. He makes a memorable entrance into the epic: Dietrich pulls him out of a dragon's mouth (Sistram keeps yelling instructions to the king while danging from the dragon's jaws). To commemorate the event, Sistram wears green armor adorned with a green and a brown dragon. He is described as tall and lean, fair, with light blond, curly hair and bright eyes. He enjoys play and games, drinking, eating, and other forms of merriment.

Essentially, he is the guy at the party that makes good use of the story that starts with "No shit, there I was, half swallowed by a dragon..."

Fun fact: Sistram doesn't actually appear in the legend of Virginal. There is another knight that gets fished out of a dragon's mouth, but since he is not nearly as interesting as Sistram, I merged the two episodes, and the two knights, into one.

Story Saturday: Dwarf Love, Elf Love (Exploring the Dietrich Cycle, IV)

As I am working on the Dietrich cycle, a full storytelling show is slowly taking form, pieced together from different parts of the sagas. It has to do with King Dietrich and his court, and their relationship with the Dwarven realms under the mountains.
Some of these relationships are fairly personal.

I have gotten several messages and opinions about the question I posed last week. While most people are comfortable with the idea of a Dwarf queen, some of them expressed worries that she would not make a good love interest for a human (let alone a human king).
Here is the thing: The storytelling show, as it looks now, includes not one, but two inter-species relationships. One of each: Dwarf king - Human princess, Human king - Dwarf queen.

I am the storyteller, therefore I have to make some decisions of how I tell these stories. And I have the same responsibility of representation as any other form of media would.

Here are some things I do NOT want to do:
1. Have an Elf queen rule over the mountains because she is prettier than a Dwarf.
2. Abduction and rape. That trope is just not happening on my watch.
3. Make one of those couples OK, but not the other.
4. Twist the original legends completely out of shape.
5. Completely rely on the Tolkien/pop culture images of Dwarfs.

Female Dwarf concept art
for The Hobbit movie

Here are some things that I DO want to try:
1. Expand ideas of beauty. There seems to be a huge debate on the Internet (thank you, LotR fandom) about what Dwarf women look like, and whether they can be attractive to human men or not. I think most of the debate is fairly dumb, and it mostly hinges on beards.
2. Explore inter-cultural relationships. For me, neither relationship has their most potential in physical Dwarf-Human compatibility. Rather, they come from very different places, and very different cultures, and they have to navigate the transition from one to the other (a human princess living in a Dwarf kingdom, a Dwarf queen running a human court).
3. Explore the male-to-male and female-to-female connections of these two related families. Laurin and Dietrich talk quite a lot, king to king; but I also want to find connection points where the Dwarf Queen can talk with the human princess. Put the two ideas of femininity and royalty next to each other. Make the saga pass the Bechdel test.
4. Play off of pop culture why staying close to the original sagas.

Gender-bent Thorin,
because Rule 63

Here are some things I know:
1. Dwarf-and-Elf love has been done in pop culture, with ambiguous results.
2. A lot of people are still bothered by the idea of a shorter man having a relationship with a taller woman. (Look at all the Kiliel fan art, they keep hiding the height difference)
3. A lot of people are still bothered with a woman having a stockier body type than a willowy Elf.
4. NO ONE in folklore ever had a problem with fairy maidens marrying human men.
5. Dwarf women are treated as mostly nonexistent, both in pop culture and in folklore. (My favorite counter-example, of course, is Terry Pratchett's The Fifth Elephant.)

Also, I should be writing a take-home exam.
We'll see how this goes.

Story Saturday: Exploring the Dietrich cycle III. - DWARFS RULE

If you thought you got all your Dwarven Epicness needs fulfilled by The Hobbit - think again.
This is where Tolkien went to school.

"It should be known for what reason God created the great giants and the little dwarfs, and subsequently the heroes. First, he produced the dwarfs, because the mountains lay waste and useless, and valuable stores of silver and gold, with gems and pearls, were consealed in them. Therefore God made the dwarfs right wise and crafty, that they could distinguish good and bad, and to what use all things should be applied. They knew the use of gems - that some of gave strength to the wearer, others made them invisible, which they called fog-caps. Therefore God gave art and wisdom to them, that they built them hollow hills; he gave them nobility, so that they, as well as the heroes, were kings and lords; and he gave them great riches. And the reason why God created the giants, was that they should slay the wild beasts and worms (dragons, serpents) and thus enable the dwarfs to cultivate the mountains in safety. But after some time it happened that the giants became wicked and unfaithful, and did much harm to the dwarfs. Then God created the heroes, who were a middle rank between the dwarfs and giants. And it should be known that the heroes were worthy and faithful for many years, and that they were created to come to the assistance of the dwarfs, against the unfaithful giants, the beasts, and the worms... Among the dwarfs were many kings, who had giants for their servants; for they possessed rough countries, waste forests, and mountains near their dwellings."

This is a quote from one of the Heldenbücher, the Books of Heroes of German tradition (I got it from this source). And boy does it contain a lot to talk about.

There are a number of important Dwarf characters that play a part in the Dietrich Cycle. First and foremost, of course, is King Laurin, who rules over (or, rather, under) the mountains of Tyrol - more specifically, the group of the Dolomites in Northern Italy known as the Rose Garden. His realm is named after the garden his daughter planted on the mountains, in the open air (since roses don't grow in the Dwarfs' underground kingdom). The Rose Garden becomes the center (and the name) of one of Dietrich's most famous adventures.

Another Dwarven king we encounter is King Walberan, Laurin's uncle, who rules an immense realm ranging from the Caucasus to the Sinai. When Laurin is captured by Dietrich, and dragged to Bern (Verona), Walberan shows up with a Dwarf army to take revenge on Dietrich. The bloodshed is narrowly avoided by King Laurin's diplomatic skills, and the fact that he is in love with one of the knights' sisters, Künhilde. The story ends in reconciliation, and Dwarf-Human inter-species marital bliss.

The third person I want to mention is Queen Virginal. I know I have been all about her before, but I am circling back now. Here is the thing: She is not a Dwarf, but she should be. She is Queen of the Mountains, rules over Dwarves, wears a crown with a magic gemstone in it, and holds off an invasion of evil giants and DRAGONS. The stories call her an Elf maiden, but let's be real here, people: That's never gonna happen. Not on my watch.
So.
POLLING TIME! Cast your votes in an orderly fashion:
Would you rather hear a story about
1. An Elf maiden queen who rules over a mountain kingdom, and only manages to hold off the evil powers gathering against her by the power of the stone in her crown, until she is rescued by Dietrich, whom she marries, giving up her kingdom without a second thought, 
OR
2. A Dwarven queen who defends her lands with the unexpected last minute help of human knights, fights an epic battle, and ends up in an even more unexpected relationship with said human knight, eventually marrying him and maybe still ruling over her own kingdom?...

I am asking this for research purposes. Because one way or another, the Rose Garden and Virginal might end up being a full-hour show I work on. 

Story Saturday: Exploring the Dietrich Cycle II. - Dragons, Dwarves, and Love Stories

(No, this is not about The Hobbit)

As I promised last week, I am working my way though the Dietrich Cycle - just finished Great Norse, Celtic and Teutonic Legends - and picking and choosing stories that I will want to work with in the future for storytelling performances.
For today, I have an assortment of love stories for your consideration. Like in all medieval romances (duh), there is a lot of them around Dietrich and his valiant knights - and some are more quirky than others.

Hilgunde and Hildburg
(I really just have to accept that every single female name in the saga starts with Hil- or Sig-)
What can the emperor of Constantinople do when he wishes to marry a princess locked away in a tower? Obviously, he goes undercover. In the case of Hugdieterich, that means that he dresses up as a lady, and learns "the ways of women" - so well, in fact, that he becomes famous for his embroidery, and is hired, under the name Hilgunde (his own imaginary sister), to tutor the princess Hildburg. He spends several weeks in the court, and a strong friendship grows between him and the princess - who eventually discovers that her tutor is in fact a man, an emperor no less. Their friendship grow into something more... someone more, actually (babies!!). But that's another story.

Mighty Huntress Princess Minnie
(This would be such a perfect name for an anime!)
In this story another emperor (this time of Rome, or Romaburg) wishes to marry a princess - and is slightly surprised when he is told by her father that the decision is up to her. Once Dietwart and his royal entourage arrive to propose, the Lady Minnie tells them she needs time to get to know the emperor, and make up her mind whether she likes it or not. This slightly anachronistic feminist streak is starting to freak out everyone's masculinity, so they decide to go on a hunt. Turns out, the princess is actually a "mighty huntress" - which makes Dietwart and his boys scoff at her, until she leaves them behind in the dust, and makes the first kill. Unfortunately, she and her maids also scare up a dragon in the woods, and while she keeps shooting arrows at it, they can't break the dragon's scales. She turns to run, and falls... Dietwart to the rescue!
Turns out that killing a dragon and having your chest ripped open is a great in with the ladies. Also turns out that Princess Minnie is also an accomplished healer. Things just work out sometimes.

Herburt and Hild
Nothing illustrates better the difference between the King Arthur cycle and the Dietrich cycle than the fact that they both have a version of Tristan and Isolde - and the latter has a happy ending. Even more than that, it actually involves Tristan's older (and smarter) brother, Herburt - and King Arthur's very own daughter. Talk about royal families being connected.
The gist is the same: King Dietrich wishes to marry King Arthur's fair daughter, but she can't be approached by anyone. Dietrich's good man Herburt goes undercover, gets hired by Arthur, and soon becomes his trusted steward. He designs genius ways to catch a glimpse of the princess (even though she is covered in sheets and surrounded by knights and monks all the time). He ends up becoming her personal servant (as per the princess' request), and honorably proposes to Hild - in Dietrich's name. Hild, obviously, does not like this one bit, and honestly, neither does Herburt. So they run away together. Being pursued by the two most powerful monarchs of European legend and history (one of them literally breathes fire), Herburt and Hild do the only sensible thing: They have sex. Now that she is not a virgin, she is obligated to be Herburt's wife. Everyone can go home. German practicality wins over English drama.

Wow, this got longer than I expected. I'll have to leave the dwarves for next time.
Tune in next week for more!

Story Saturday: Exploring the Dietrich Cycle I. - A mosaic of tales

We are now in the second half of the year, which means that I have begun work on the second epic of my choice, under the J. J. Reneaux grant and the mentorship of the amazing Cathryn Fairlee. After long consideration, I decided to work with the Dietrich Cycle. A number of factors helped me make the decision:

1. I read the Saga of Thidrek of Bern for the A to Z challenge this year, and I enjoyed it immensely
2. I also read the Queen of the Mountains for A to Z and it is epic in all senses of the world
3. I have worked on a version of King Laurin's Rose Garden for my book (under Invisibility) and I always wanted to dig into the whole German "dwarf kingdoms" mythology more
4. Part of my heritage is Swabian, and after the Persian epic I wanted to explore something closer to home.

The Dietrich Cycle is a collection of German legends centered on King Dietrich, a mythical knight-hero figure loosely based on Theoderic the Great. Unlike the Persian Book of Kings, it is essentially a mosaic of stories I get to piece together for myself, from various sources. My main source (the most coherent and comprehensive one) is the Saga of Thidrek, a Norse re-telling of the German legends. Because of this fractured nature, there will be a lot of work with selecting the parts I want to tell, exploring the world of Dietrich and his companions, and shaping it all into one (or more) storytelling performance.

I decided to journal this process in my upcoming Story Saturday posts. Dietrich is not nearly as internationally well known as King Arthur is, and yet there are a lot of similarities - and also a lot of unique elements that make the saga cycle exciting. If you don't believe me, read my A to Z posts about the best bits!

For starters, here is a list of the sources I am working with. The ones with links attached are available for free from archive.org (yay!):

The Saga of Thidrek of Bern (translated by Edward Haymes, 1988)

Dietrich of Berne and the Dwarf King Laurin (by Ruth Sawyer, 1963) - This one actually turned out to be a novelized re-telling, I'll probably read it at the end for flavor

Great Norse, Celtic and Teutonic Legends (by Wilhelm Wagner, 2004)

The Wayland-Dietrich Saga (by Katherine M. Buck, 1924) - This one is an 8-volume (!!) attempt at a coherent poetic English re-telling of the entire cycle (Kalevala style)

Hero Tales & Legends of the Rhine (by Lewis Spence, 1915)

Teutonic Myth and Legend (by Donald Mackenzie, 1934)

Epics and Romances of the Middle Ages (by Wilhelm Wagner, 1884)

Illustrations of Northern Antiquities (by Henry Weber, 1814)

Tales and Legends of the Tyrol (by Comtesse von Günther, 1874)

The Heroic Saga-Cycle of Dietrich of Bern (by F.E. Sandbach, 1906)

Hopefully, by next week I will be able to introduce you to some characters that will be making an appearance.
Also, dragons.
Stay tuned!

Story Saturday: Fairy tale re-tellings - The Good, the Bad, the Meh

Last week's Top Ten Tuesday was about fairy tale adaptations. I spent hours and hours browsing people's lists of their favorite books, adult and Young Adult, based on folk- and fairy tales. It was very telling for a number of reasons. One, it showed what different people think fairy tales are, and the definition varied greatly. Some lists only included folktales (mostly Grimm), while others had things like Alice, Peter Pan, or even The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (I'm looking at you, Disney).

Two, it was fascinating to see which fairy tales get re-told in current literature more often than others. According to my (non-scientific) survey of many lists, Beauty and the Beast and Cinderella seemed to be winning the day. Surprisingly enough the 1001 Nights also appeared quite often (but always in the form of the same 2 books), and of course there were a few other well known tales such as Snow White and the Twelve Dancing Princesses. Since I was looking for some light reads for the end of the summer, I got copies of 3 of the most often mentioned books, and read them.
Here is my impression of them, from a storyteller's perspective:
(SPOILERS)

The Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas
Here we have a teenage girl from a starving family, who is really good with a bow because she hunts to keep them fed, and who volunteers to go to an unknown place and die to save her sisters. When she gets there, she is given a makeover, lives in a luxurious environment, still manages to get herself into mortal danger, and saves an entire country in the end.
Ahem.
Here is the thing I realized: It seems to me that most supernatural romances these days ARE re-tellings of Beauty and the Beast. You get the teenage girl, whisked away against her will, just to find out that her "beautiful and lethal" captor is the love of her life. Something about this fairy tale, something about this trope, sticks so deep in people's minds that it is still commanding popularity and attention, even though it is more than a little bit problematic.
(As a storyteller, I never liked Beauty and the Beast)
Don't get me wrong, this book was actually not bad at all (I gave it 4 stars on Goodreads). It just also wasn't very surprising. The only glimpse of greatness was the idea of combining the ballad of Tam Lin with the second part of Beauty and the Beast - and yet, the iconic shape-shifting rescue scene from the ballad never made it into the book. Such a pity.

The Wrath and the Dawn by Renée Ahdieh
Unlike the previous one, this book actually was bad. Really bad. I have a personal soft spot for the 1001 Nights as a storyteller (I even worked for a gaming company that made an MMORPG based on it), but that wasn't my main problem. This book is just not well done. It has plot holes, horrible clichés, an unlikable main character (nicknamed "Shazi"), and a total of two and a half stories told. It swaps the iconic element of the original story - Shahrzad's nightly series of storytelling - for a tired romantic cliché: The girl doesn't get more days to live because her stories are intriguing; she is allowed to live because the king finds her attractive (also, she cries and begs to be allowed to live, which clearly the previous 60-70 executed wives did not think of doing).
As a storyteller, the rock bottom for me was the night when Shazi decided it was a great idea to tell her bride-murdering husband the tale of Bluebeard. Because bride-murderers clearly want to hear stories about other bride-murderers. They are open-minded like that. At the end (before she begged to live, again) Shazi pointed out that the moral of the story is that you should not keep secrets from your wife.
That's not the moral of Bluebeard.
(Ironically, Bluebeard and Mr. Fox are probably the best counterpoint to the message Beauty and the Beast seems to be sending about romance)

The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly by Stephanie Oakes
Now THIS is how you do a Grimm re-telling. Oakes made a good choice of a less well-known tale, one of Grimm's most disturbing: The Handless Maiden. True to the original, the book is dark, gruesome, emotionally heavy, and yet compelling in its empathy for all characters involved. The language is eloquent, and the author never rubs your nose in the original story (no "It was so grim! Get it? GET IT?!"). Instead, you are left on your own to find the subtle hints and familiar imagery as the story goes along. That is what usually wins me over for fairy tale re-tellings: When I am invited to an easter egg hunt for fairy tale nuggets, but they are not marked with big pointy neon signs along the road.
(It is also very telling that many Goodreads reviews either complained that there was not enough romance in this, or said that it was just plain 'boring.' Compared to the previous two books I mentioned, this one is definitely more of an intellectual challenge. Take that or leave it as you will)

Final thoughts: I would love to see more of a range in the fairy- and folktales being re-told. I made a wish list a couple of weeks ago, so I'll just link it here. If you have any suggestions for other books I should read (now that you have seen my taste in these things), they are most welcome! :)

Story Saturday: Arthurian re-tellings I actually like

Because of my storyteller hissy fit earlier this week about the latest King Arthur remake in the works, several people asked me if there are any re-tellings of Arthurian legends that I actually like. Believe it or not, there are some. My problem is not with the idea of re-tellings; my problem is with re-tellings done wrong.
And yes, I realize this is an entirely subjective judgment.

So, just to prove that I am not some anti-adaptation storyteller grump, here is a list of My Favorite Arthurian Things:

The Once and Future King by T.H. White
This was my point of entry and fandom of origin, my introduction to Arthurian legends. I don't even remember when I read it first, but I could not have been more than thirteen years old. I still love this book. It is a great re-telling, both epic and very, very human. And I love what he did with Merlin.

The Squire's Tales series by Gerald Morris
Talk about human. Morris treats Arthurian legends with empathy, great humor, and very deep understanding. He leaves the magic in, but does not shy away from making fun of certain characters, or calling out the inconsistencies in Arthurian lore. His protagonists are lovable, and he portrays Arthur exactly as I imagined him to be. Also, he does justice both to Gawain and to Kay, which is always a bonus in my eyes.
If you only read one thing from this list, read this. If you only read one book from this series, read The Quest for the Fair Unknown. Or The Savage Damsel and the Dwarf.

Excalibur (1981)
The prefect Arthurian movie has already been made, and it is called Excalibur. It is a classic. It is strange, and sometimes surreal, and very close to the original, and all-around awesome.

Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
What? It's the kind of humor I like. And the Hungarian dub is hilarious. Also, it's a very, very quotable movie.

The Arthur Trilogy by Kevin Crossley-Holland
Okay, so I only read the first of these three books so far, but I really liked his take on the story. Also, the stories embedded inside the story. And the idea of seeing Arthur as a child of the crossing places.

Taliesin by Stephen Lawhead
The first book in a series, and only marginally Arthur-related, but I have a soft spot for this book anyway. Partly, because I loved seeing Taliesin's legend re-told, and partly because it also features some Minoan culture, which was a strange mix that somehow worked.

So, there you have it. I am sure there are more good re-tellings out there, I just have not found them yet. Also, there are a good many that are more popular than these... But as I have mentioned earlier, I am very picky.

Story Saturday: Ant-Man and other Small Things

Ant-Man is out, and it's cashing in at the box office. As the latest installment of the Marvel franchise, it is a fairly entertaining movie which can be placed in the overlap between The Borrowers and MacGyver (if you belong to my generation, that is pretty much childhood squared). It is also PG-13 (PG-12 in Hungary, because obviously Hungarian children are more mature), and I have seen a large number of very excited children watching it in the movie theater.
In the spirit of combining pop culture with traditional tales, here is how storytellers can make the most of the new craze for ants. Because let's face it, the ants are the true heroes of this story.

There is a Chinese folktale in which a student walking to the state exam sees an anthill about to be washed away by a stream. He stops to make a bridge of sticks and helps the ants walk to safety. Later, as he is handing in his written exam, he notices that he made a mistake - one of the signs he wrote is incorrect. He is about to panic, when he sees a couple of tiny ants march onto the paper and take on the shape of the correct sign. A good deed deserves another. Also, apparently ants are great for Spellcheck.

There is also another Chinese tale that portrays white ants as tiny warriors, with their own king and kingdom. They reward human kindness in a similar way.

The 7th book of Ovid's Metamorphoses tells the myth of King Aeacus of Aegina, who populated his land by asking Zeus to change ants into people. Thus the Myrmidons were born, and became fabled warriors - among them, Achilles, Aeacus' grandson.

There are also legends of giant ants from Herodotus, in case you are looking for something more terrifying. This one is more of a handbook than a story, but it is easy to turn it into one.

Ants also feature into the Grimm tale known as the Queen Bee, as the helpers of the hero. (The motif in which ants help someone gather scattered pearls or seeds is marked in the Thompson motif index as H1091.1, and it shows up in many tales around the world).

A hero being able to change himself into an ant appears in the Norwegian story of Boots and the Beasts (I included my telling of this one in my book too, under Shape-shifting) (Honestly, I am not doing this on purpose, I just did a lot of my storytelling research for that book...)

I am not mentioning the Ants and the Grasshopper on purpose - I never liked it as a child. On the other hand, Aesop's fable of the Ant and a Dove is a very neat little story.

There is a site for Native American ant myths and legends that has some very beautiful stories on it.

There is also a West African folktale that combines a Cinderella story type with a helpful ant queen. You can find the picture book here. I have not read it, but it got some really nice reviews.

Ants are awesome. Have fun, storytellers! :)

Story Saturday: The King of the Frozen Lands

Once again, I promised a fellow storyteller to give them the bones of a Hungarian folktale - and since I am scheduling this post ahead of time, I might as well do it now. In the middle of a heat wave in Hungary, maybe a winter tale will cool things off a little...

Jégország királya (The King of the Frozen Lands)
Collected & published by Elek Benedek here.
(Not quite the way I tell it, but this is the original version)

- Poor man has an incredible number of sons, each apprentices for a different craft; the youngest doesn't have anything left for him - decides that he will be a king, or die trying
- blacksmith brother makes him three pairs of iron shoes, mother bakes him three pieces of ash bread, off he goes, travels for a long time, wears down the first pair of shoes
- arrives to the Black Kingdom (everything is black), asks the steward of the castle if they need a king - he laughs at the boy, the king has many children
- goes on, wears off second pair of shoes, arrives to the Red Kingdom (everything is red), goes to the king and asks if he is looking for an heir
- Red King has an only daughter, and is at war with his neighbor, the King of the Frozen Lands; sent many soldiers, but they all froze. The Ice King is all made of ice, he can freeze half the lands with his breath
- with the last pair of iron shoes the boy sets out to defeat the Ice King. He arrives to a little hut and asks the old woman there for shelter. The old woman says her son is the Sun, and they should not wake him
- in the morning János (the boy) asks the Sun politely to shine on the Frozen Kingdom. The Sun says he only helps people who deserve it - János has to prove his worth first
- János goes north and arrives to mountains that touch the sky - the border of the Frozen Lands
- hears a noise - finds a polar bear that has a splinter in its foot - the Ice King was hunting, and the bear got over the mountains to get away
- János helps the bear - gets a hair from him to be able to call when in need
- climbs halfway up the mountain - meets three dwarves around a fire - their beards are frozen - they escaped from the Frozen Lands, try to talk János out of going there - he helps them thaw their beards out, and in exchange they give him a whistle and a promise to help
- János gets to the top - has to lie down and crawl through between the sky and the mountaintop
- on the inside everything is frozen ("I should have become a shoemaker...")
- pulls out the hair, the polar bear appears - asks him to take him down the mountain - bear warns him, "you will freeze" - goes anyway
- they get to the bottom of the mountain, János falls off the bear, starts to freeze from the ground up
- blows the whistle - dwarves appear - sends them to the Sun to tell the story
- János freezes completely, polar bear lies down to guard him
- dwarves go and tell the Sun everything - the next day the Sun makes a change on his way and shines above the Frozen Lands - everything thaws, the animals, the plants, the red armies
- János thaws - now he has a crown of ice and a specter of ice
- mounts the polar bear and leads the armies to the castle of the Ice King - it has already melted, with the king in it
- János becomes the new Ice King - marries the Red Princess - they spend winters in the Red Kingdom, and summers in the Frozen Lands - brings all his family to his kingdom as well

(It was fun to re-read the original version, after I have been telling this story for several years. My version is essentially still the same, but there were also changes I didn't even notice I made. Note: It is an interesting exercise to sometimes go back and see how much your stories changed through repeated telling...)

Story Saturday: Why you should research your folktales

Full disclosure: I am a storytelling research junkie. I go so far down rabbit holes that I technically live in Wonderland. I follow interesting stories until I run into sources that are in medieval dialects. I lose chunks of time when I'm in the library. If a story doesn't have at least three documented sources, I feel naked.

I have recently been asked: Is all that research really necessary?
Well, maybe not quite all of it. Part of it is the excitement of discovery - feeling like a storytelling Indiana Jones (incidentally, I'm also a trained archaeologist). BUT researching your folktales does have some very practical and important benefits.
Some of them, based on my experience, are:

1. You might find out they are not actually folktales
I lost count of how many times I saw a story quoted as a folktale, just to eventually trace it back to a literary source. I found a "fifth branch of the Mabinogion," written by an amazingly talented college student. I found "Greek myths" that were made up by English poets in the 17th century. I found "Chinese folktales" "inspired by" folklore sources.
I have nothing against literary stories - but I like to know if my folktales are actually folktales. For copyright and intellectual property reasons, if nothing else.

2. You get to know your stories better
If you really want to work with a story, the more familiar you are with it and its origins, the better your work gets. Knowing the material you are working with is part of being a professional. And "knowing" usually goes beyond a cursory read of a picture book.

3. Kids. WILL. Ask.
Adults will too, but kids especially. They will want to know things that you did not include in the story. Who was the hero's father? What does that country look like? What do tapirs eat? How far is Ireland from Greece? These are things that I have come across while researching folktales and legends, and they have came in handy when the children started to ask. I wrote more about one particular event here.
Being able to answer questions does not only make you feel cooler, but also enhances the storytelling and learning experience. Especially useful when you tell in an educational setting.

4. You get to pick your favorite version
Looking at several sources will result in several different versions of the same folktale. This way, you may find one that is even better than the first one you encountered first. Or you might want to combine elements of several of them to create your own. I talked about that process earlier this week.

5. It weeds out mistakes
Sources of folktales make mistakes sometimes. These might be translation mistakes (like Cinderella's infamous glass slipper, or "leopard" becoming "tiger" in many African folktales), or factual mistakes, like the heroes of an Arab folktale sharing a cup of wine (unless the story is pre-Islam). I used to change animals around in some children's stories, until I realized that those particular animals had particular meanings in the given culture. Researching the sources of your sources, and learning more about the tales, helps you avoid these mistakes. The fact that no one might ever notice, doesn't change the fact that they are there.

6. You might find other stories
Part of researching your stories is reading other tales from the same tradition. It expands your view of a folktale, and you might even find other stories with the same hero or same symbols. If you supplement your research into one tale with immersing yourself in the entire oral tradition it comes from, you might find several new stories you would not have found otherwise. I had this experience when one random tale in a multicultural collection led me on a binge of amazing Zhuang folktales.

7. It breeds cultural sensitivity
I left this one last, because I cannot stress this enough. Researching a story reveals the importance of that story within tradition. Your research does not only teach you about one tale; ideally, it will teach you about the culture it came from, or the many cultures that passed it on. This creates a sense of culture, and a sense of respect for telling tales from cultures other than your own. You might even find out that the tale holds a sacred role in its original context, and decide to respectfully refrain from telling it. It happens. It's part of a storyteller's job. There are countless tales to find, track, and learn about.
That's what research is for.

In conclusion, here is a screenshot of my computer, researching the Silent Princess folktale type:

Story Saturday: Night of the Museums

Story Saturday falls on a Sunday this week. Reason: I spent yesterday in Budapest at the annual Night of Museums, and was too busy to write. Today I am catching up with a full report on some museum storytelling fun :)

I started the afternoon (after getting fabulous Northern Lights-themed make-up done by a friend of mine) at the Hungarian National Museum - and with that, checked another dream museum venue off my bucket list. Incidentally, their theme for this year was Dreams, and they invited me to do two shows, one for kids, and one for adults.
The children's storytelling took place in the crafts room where kids could paint and draw dream creatures; one corner had a carpet and a pile of pillows ready for listening. The room was not very spacious, and it filled up very quickly with children and their parents - about a dozen families or so. I told tales that featured dreams and dreaming in some form: A story about a baku that eats bad dreams, the King's daughter who lost her hair, Ma Liang's magic paintbrush, and La noche del tatú. The little stars in the corners of my eyes didn't last long with all the eye-rubbing I did for the stories; as they fell to the carpet, a little girl immediately collected them for souvenirs. I also had the world's best-behaved two-year-old in the audience, who just happened to have my name.
The adult show took place on the stairs of the museum's main hall; people sat on pillows on the stairs, and I stood below them on the landing. I got a microphone which carried my voice through the echoing main hall and over the noise of people streaming up and down the parallel stairwell. At first I thought I would have some moving traffic, but the stairs soon filled up with listeners, and I ended up with about thirty people sitting through the entire one-hour show (including some well-behaved kids who had parental supervision). I told an Aesop's fable about Zeus inventing dreams (a new addition to my mythology repertoire), a folktale from the Inner Hebrides about the Makers of Dreams (I have wanted to try this one for a long time, it's a gorgeous story); I told Zal and Rudabeh because I could (it does feature a prophetic dream at one point) and it worked miracles as usual; and in closing I told the legend of Angus Og and Caer. The loud, echoing quality the microphone gave my voice was strange at first, but I managed to play with it so it actually added to the storytelling atmosphere. The audience was smiling and very attentive. Adults shows are awesome, because I can tell all the longer, more poetic tales...

After the two dream-shows I traveled across town to Óbuda and climbed a hill to get to the second venue of the night: the Polaris Observatory. The sun was setting when I got there, but they already had telescopes set up on the roof, and people peering at the moon and the evening star. I arrived early enough to sit in on a presentation about the history of telescopes, and learned a lot from it. My own theme was the Northern Lights (hence the make-up and the costuming), and by the time 9pm rolled around the room was so full we started worrying about fire regulations - we easily had 50 adults and children, if not more... In one hour, I had ample time to tell all 5 stories I prepared (see my previous Folklore Thursday post), and they all worked great! I started with Lindu, and then told Niekija (the longest of the five). After the two love stories I decided to go a little darker, and told Lights in a Bottle - there was an adorable and very vocal five-year-old girl in the front row who made comments about the story. I was worried at first that she would be scared of the ghosts in the bottle, but the story itself took care of the issue, by making the Lights chase the ghosts away. Next I told the Scottish legend about the Merry Dancers; the boys in the back cheered loudly for the fighting and the rain of blood. I bought a bracelet made of heliotrope earlier that morning to be able to show the kids what the "blood-stained" rocks look like, and after the show they all lined up to inspect the bracelet up close. I closed the hour with the Estonian story about sleighs in the sky (probably the most cheerful of the five), and let the audience go so they could observe the star-lit night sky from the roof.

All in all, it was a perfect afternoon/evening of storytelling. I especially loved how Night of the Museums made me create two entirely new themed shows. I am definitely keeping them.

Story Saturday: The Seven Deadly Sins of Storytelling

I am working on a book (in Hungarian) on storytelling, and I have been doing a lot of thinking about the difference between 'good' and 'bad' storytelling. I believe that the difference is not between styles or traditions - those are up to everyone's taste - but rather in quality. There are certain things that can ruin a performance or a show, whatever the style is.
So, for Story Saturday I present to you my (completely subjective) list of Seven Deadly Sins of Storytelling (in no particular order):

Sloth: Having a small repertoire
No one wants to hear the same stories over and over again, even if they are amazing. A storyteller should be constantly expanding their repertoire, learning new things, discovering new tales. A small repertoire doesn't only bore an audience (and make getting repeat gigs a lot harder), but it also shows in the storyteller's attitude: One gets bored even with their favorite stories sometimes, and telling something you are bored with is never very entertaining.

Greed: A lack of integrity
Sometimes storytellers face choices that require integrity. These choices can be presented by event organizers (asking for stories the storyteller doesn't tell for ethical reasons, for example; or asking to tell for free instead of another storyteller who would charge them); other times they can be due to criticisms from fellow tellers. Whatever the case, integrity is just as important in a storyteller's work as in any other vocation.

Pride: Thinking it's about you
It is dangerous to believe that stories exist to make the storyteller look good on stage. Some tellers select stories not for their meaning or importance, or for liking them, but rather for their utility - how "flashy" they can be made, or how "sellable" they are. This usually comes with other questionable things, like bending stories out of shape, or a lack of respect for tales from other cultures. Especially when someone is telling traditional stories, storytelling requires a certain level of humility.

Wrath: Impatience with the audience
If you are a performing storyteller, you should be able to handle your audience. Of course it is partly up to the organizers to make sure the setting is quiet and organized - and even to gently remind parents of screaming toddles in an adult performance to please take them outside - but the storyteller can't push all responsibility on them. Being impatient with the audience if they are not engaged with the story only makes a situation worse. No one likes to be yelled or glared at from the stage.



Envy: Copying other storytellers
If this list was in order of seriousness, this would definitely be on top. Not respecting other storytellers' work shows a lack of respect for the profession of storytelling in general ("it's okay to steal it, they didn't work that hard on it anyway"). Even folktales can be a storyteller's own if they have developed their own signature telling and version. Taking anything - signature stories, original tales, workshop materials, etc. - without asking permission is rude, to say the least.

Gluttony: Taking stories that don't belong to you
Some stories, for various reasons, can be off limits. Maybe they are under copyright law, or maybe they belong to a sacred tradition that doesn't want them told out of context. Whatever the case, telling stories just because there is no "storytelling police" to stop you is not very ethical.

Lust: ?
Honestly I couldn't come up with a lust-related sin (other than "don't make kids at storytelling competitions tell bawdy stories" - I have seen that happen), so I am going to put one here that is important: Not telling well. All the passion and integrity in the world will not help you if you don't speak loud enough. It is definitely one of the deadly sins if the storyteller fails to perform as well as the stories require; if she/he mutters, stutters, drawls on forever, looses track of the plot, "umm's" and "err's", or, like, uses words that don't go with the story's mood, dude.

What other storytelling sins or mistakes do you think are important to mention?

Story Saturday: Heroes Assemble!

Who's your favorite Argonaut?*

I'm a sucker for teams of heroes. I am not sure why, but ever since I started reading legends and mythology, I can not get enough stories about groups of warriors, bards, demigods and other misfits teaming up for great adventures. I am enchanted by group dynamics. Fascinated with combat cooperation. And just all-around happy that I could find stories where interesting characters got together for a gig.
(In case you were wondering: I read mythology way before I read comics, so I guess I liked the X-men and the Avengers because I liked team myths, not the other way around)

So, for today's Story Saturday post, here is a list of my all-time favorite hero teams from world folklore and mythology. In no particular order.

1. The Fianna
People following this blog are probably starting to get the idea that I have a Fianna fixation. They are right.
Culture of origin: Celtic (mainly Irish, but there are a lot of Scottish stories too)
What I like about them: They walk between worlds like I walk to the grocery store. Also, they need to know fighting AND poetry to get in.
Favorite members: Oisín, Fionn, and Caoilte, in THAT particular order.
Book recommendations: Lady Gregory's Gods and Fighting Men, and Rosemary Suttcliff's High Deeds of Finn mac Cool

2. The Argonauts
I always had a soft spot for sailing, and also for all-star Greek hero team-ups. Honestly, half of Graves' Greek Mythology was on that ship. Including Hercules.
Culture of origin: Very Greek
What I like about them: Mostly the fact that so many famous characters ended up on one ship. Also, their adventures are pretty awesome too.
Favorite members: Atalanta (the only female Argonaut), Orpheus, Kalais and Zetes
Book recommendations: Robert Graves' The Golden Fleece

3. The Knights of the Round Table
I grew up on these stories, and I am extremely picky about how they are told and adapted (which is why I might be the only person in the world who broke out in hives from BBC's Merlin).
Culture of origin: Welsh / British
What I like about them: It is one of the most epic stories ever told, and it still has a hold on people.
Favorite members: Sir Kay (hands down, no contest), and Sir Gawain, but I really like Arthur too.
Book recommendations: T.H. White's Once and Future King

4. Dietrich of Bern
This is a fairly new one, I read the Norse saga version for this year's A to Z Challenge post.
Culture of origin: German
What I like about them: It is an awesome lineup of diverse characters with interesting background stories. Also, someone gets fished out of the mouth of a dragon.
Favorite members: Hildebrand, Sistram, and Wittich (Vidga)
Book recommendations: The saga of Thidrek of Bern

5. Water Margin
Also known as Outlaws of the Marsh. One of three great Chinese epics, this one takes the cake in number of heroes: There is 108 of them, 105 men and 3 women.
Culture of origin: Chinese
What I like about them: All the heroes have their own backstories, skills, fighting styles, and trials. And very colorful personalities.
Favorite members: Lin Chong (Panther Head), Shi Jin (Nine Tattooed Dragons)
Books recommendations: Shi Nai'an's Water Margin

In addition, honorable mentions are due to Robin Hood and his Merry Men (recently planned for a shared universe movie series by Sony, God help us all), Charlemagne and his knights, the Jómsvikings, and Journey to the West. I could go on and on and on about hero teams... Which one would you rather belong to? ;)

*The correct answer is: NOT Jason.

Story Saturday: MythOff takes Budapest!

Wednesday night was Hungary's very first MythOff event!
It was preceded by a lot of excitement, a lot of talking, and a lot of research, which brought our little group of 6 featured storytellers together, and fulfilled one of the main ideas of MythOff: Fostering storytelling relations. Venturing into the world of mythology was familiar to some, and new to others, but everyone put their best work and all their passion into it, and the result was... well, EPIC.

Firts off, we had full house. More than a full house. We were at absolute full capacity in the basement performance space of a very friendly Budapest bar. We had at least 50 people in the audience, probably more. Whew!
We had 3 rounds with 2 storytellers each:

Round 1: The Power of Words

In the Norse corner: Erika Hajós, with the Lay of Hárbardr, told in beautiful verse.
In the Finnish corner: Maja Bumberák, with a piece of the Kalevala about Veinemöinen meeting the giant Vipunen, also told in beautiful verse, and even sung in the end!
Both ladies were eloquent, enchanting, and their prose and verse brought out the very best of not only the original myths, but also their original language and style.
Voting question: "If Odin (Hárbardr) and Veinemöinen had a duel of words, who would win?"
The prize: A pendant with a bee on it, reminiscent of the legend about how the Greek poet Pindar got the gift of sweet spoken words.
The winner: Veinemöinen!

Round 2: Siblings and Deeds

In the Yoruba corner: Szilvia Varga-Fogarasi, telling the story of how the sons of Obatala created the world (and warning against the dangers of consuming too much palm wine).
In the Mongolian corner: Enikő Nagy, with a myth about Gesar rescuing the dying Sun Maiden, before he became a mortal hero.
Both stories touched on the topic of sibling rivalry, and the roles of siblings in family and culture.
Voting question: "Which mythical family would you rather belong to?"
The prize: A pendant depicting Gemini, named "The Patience of Siblings," reminding its wearer to always be patient with everyone, but especially family.
The winner: Everyone wants to belong to the Yoruba pantheon.

Round 3: Deception and Trickery

In the Persian corner: Csenge Zalka telling the Fall of Zahhak (as a "short" prequel to my full-hour show of Zal and Rudabeh).
In the Greek corner: László Gregus, concluding the evening's lineup with the birth and mischief of Hermes, full of wit and humor.
Yuup, we accidentally ended up with a "Greeks vs Persians" theme for the last round. Very historical...
Voting question: "If you lost your winning lottery ticket, and Hermes told you it was on one side of Budapest, and Eblis told you it was on the other, and you only had time to check one place, who would you rather believe?"
The prize: A tiny mirror, named The Mirror of Clear Vision, revealing all deception and trickery (hopefully).
The winner: People would rather believe Hermes than Evil incarnate. I would too.

It was a fun, magical, and all around successful evening. MythOff has arrived to Hungary - and it looks like it is here to stay!