A modest gathering assembled for Holiday Tales - I expect the rest were away on holiday. Seven people and two dogs we were. Maddie told us a story she had brought home from holiday, having learnt it in a workshop at Beyond the Border, the great biennial storytelling at St Donat's in Wales. Moreover, it is a Welsh story, recorded in the 12th century by Gerald de Barri, a Welsh-born Norman churchman. You can read the original version here - it starts on p. 68. Mike, too, told a story he heard at St Donat's, told there by Clare Muireann Murphy in her show with Daniel Morden. It was all about a Frenchwoman whose baking was so good and so appropriate that people suspected her of witchcraft - so she sailed away to another country, and there helped two women over the matter of a baby that was both wanted and unwanted. A dog was also involved - and the mention of this fact definitely got the attention of two members of our audience. Mark read us a most amusing account of his holiday and the preparations for it in terms of purchasing clothes and footwear.
In the second half, Michelle told her first ever story, about the King of the East and the King of the West and The Perfect Garden. Now that she's started, we look forward to hearing her tell every time.
Mike gave us what purported to be a reminiscence of a holiday on the mysterious West Coast of Scotland, which you can read here, and Maddie concluded the evening with another story she had studied in the workshop at St Donat's, Cap o' Rushes, which you can read here.
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