STORY SLAM: Food For Thought
hosted by Anne E Stewart
In the classic Australian novel, My Brother
Jack, by George Johnston, food is used as a device to describe and
differentiate various characters in his life, for example Johnston writes that Helen
his first wife borrows ideas from Ladies Home Journal, for a dinner party
creating ‘Sixteen Savouries with a Difference’.
The
result of all her labours was lavish and striking...colour was to be her
theme... and it glittered in Gherkin parings and maraschino and pale cheese and
purple olives and blushing carrot grating.......and oranges curiously
porcupined by coloured pickled onions stuck there on toothpicks...
In comparison he describes visiting friends
for ... a very simple and wonderful dinner, a
clear soup and then a huge steak and kidney pie that was bought to the table in
its blue enamel baking dish, and a chocolate mousse to follow, and dry biscuits
with Camembert and Gorgonzola. When Gavin ... cut down into the pie and the steam came and the rich baking smell, and
it went inside my head like an ecstatic drug, and for a magical instant I was
back in the old kitchen, with Mother and Jean and Marj all baking away on a
Sunday morning.
After a fight with his wife food is again
used as a way of telling the story,
… it
made me think of the steak and kidney pie....and she was out there and there
were no smells coming from the kitchen, no food smells, Sunday morning smells
and I thought of all the meals we had eaten together that had no smells, all
the clever and exotic imaginative tasteless plates of nothing that we had eaten
by the refined glow of coloured candles.
With the above as your inspiration we are
looking for stories where food is intrinsic to the narrative. It can be a fun
story, something serious, a personal story or something that happened to
someone else but at itʼs heart is food.
You will have 5 minutes to tell us your
story.
When: Saturday 6th August
Time: 2.00 to 2.50 pm
Where: Festival Hub, 81 Vincent Street Daylesford
Cost: $5 online $10 at door
BOOKINGS: Words in Winter website
WORKSHOP: Storytelling for Social Change
Personal and collective stories are important for social change. In this workshop Anne will be teasing out local, personal, traditional and community stories and illustrating how they can be used to effect social change.
Storytelling not only transforms the teller
but also creates empathy with the listener. In this interactive workshop Anne
will guide you through traditional tales that salute the power of storytelling,
help you fashion and present personal tales and develop community stories that
share cultural beliefs, history, traditions and our hopes and aspirations for a
better planet .
The skills of selecting, learning and
telling stories will be demonstrated and opportunities for participants to tell
will be included in this workshop.
The objective is to build capacity in
participants to tell stories that create empathy and contribute to positive
social change.
When: Saturday 13th August
Where: Storyhouse. 52 Millar St, Daylesford
Time: 1- 4pm
Bookings Essential: anne@anneestewart.com.au
or phone 0408 550 945
Cost: $40
Concession/ Storytelling Australia Victoria members $25
(After the workshop, stay for afternoon tea and support a letter writing campaign. Re: Youth Detention)
Anne E Stewart's website HERE
Thank you Anne E for sharing your events at Words in Winter with us. (blog ed)
