This summer the Boston Public Library features Norah Dooley telling stories from from around the world, around the branches and neighborhoods of Boston. This is in conjunction with their annual Summer Reading Program. Spoken word is the source and sustenance of written language and oral stories, in performance, make that connection come alive. All performances are free and open to the public, July 6th thru August 15th.
Norah Dooley performs in Boston Public Libraries as featured storyteller for Summer Reading 2011
Norah tells timeless folk tales from around the world. Her stories make audiences sing, laugh, and think. Noodleheads, legends, tricksters, and heroines are well represented as Norah shares engaging
traditional tales from Haiti to India, from Japan to Costa Rica, and from the Mediterranean traditions of Italy, Egypt, Ethiopia, and Algeria –including Mullah Nasreddin stories.
Telling a story in a basketball court for ReadBoston, 2010
During the past 12 summers I have worked for the Storymobile. This is ReadBoston’s most well-known and public program. Each summer about 12 storytellers tell stories at nearly 80 sites throughout the city of Boston for six weeks. These programs are free and open to the public. They are in parks and gyms and libraries. Sometimes there are 20 kids and caretakers. Sometimes hundreds. At the end of every performance every child who attends these storytelling sessions gets to pick out a free paperback book. If a child attends every week, he/she will have six brand new books to add to his/her book collection. And they will have heard 6 different storytellers tell in 6 unique styles and listen to stories. Listening to a story is not a passive act -because actively listening to stories enriches the soil of literacy which is...oral language.
It is often a "tough room", hot venues filled with squirmy and distracted kids. But it is also amazing, rewarding work. After telling "Little daughter and The Wolf" last year, a six year old came up to me and said, "When are we going to see that movie again?" Which movie, I asked. She said, with some impatience, " The one just now, about the girl and the wolf. " I said, you made up that movie listening to my words. She looked perplexed and then was yanked out by her teacher along with 9 others, on loops of rope. But I was delighted. She thought her imagination was as 'real' as a movie. Check out the schedule here: Storymobile Schedule. -
A few videos from ReadBoston:
Monday, July 11, 2011
Copley Library 10:00-10:45
66 Berkeley Street, Boston, MA 02115
Wang YMCA
8 Oak Street West, Boston (Chinatown), MA 02116
Salvation Army 1:15-2:00
1500 Washington Street, Roxbury, MA 02119
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Mosaic School 10:00-10:45
85 Seaverns Avenue, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
Bromley Heath TMC Community Service Department 11:15-12:00
30 Bickford Street, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
Marcella Park 1:15-2:00
Marcella Street/Highland Street, Roxbury, MA 02119
Monday, July 18, 2011
Ellis Memorial Children’s Center 10:00-10:45
66 Berkeley Street, Boston, MA 02116
Escuelita Boriken 11:15-12:00
85 West Newton Street, Boston, MA 02118
Ark of Cherubs 1:15-2:00
81 Walnut Ave, Roxbury, MA 02119
Friday, July 22, 2011
Crispus Attucks 10:00-10:45
105 Crawford Street, Dorchester, MA 02121
Egleston Square Library 11:15-12:00
2044 Columbus Avenue, Roxbury, MA 02119
Carter Playground 1:15-2:00
Columbus Avenue & Camden Street, Roxbury, MA 02118
Monday, August 1
Billings Field 10:00-10:45
Centre Street and LaGrange Street
2030 Centre Street, West Roxbury, MA 02132
Ohrenberger C.C. 11:15-12:00
175 West Boundary Road, West Roxbury, MA 02132
Mattapan Library 1:15-2:00
1350 Blue Hill Avenue, Mattapan, MA 02126
Tuesday, August 9
West End House Boys and Girls Club 10:00-10:45
105 Allston Street, Allston, MA 02134
Honan-Allston Library 11:15-12:00
300 North Harvard Street, Allston, MA 02134
Jackson Mann Community Center 1:15-2:00
500 Cambridge Street, Allston, MA 02134
Thursday, August 11, 2011
United South End Settlements, 10:00-10:45
48 Rutland Street, Boston, MA 02118
TADPole Playground 11:00-11:45
Boston Common, Boston (next to the Frog Pond)
Boston Chinatown Neighborhood Center/Josiah Quincy School, 1:15-2:00
885 Washington Street, Boston, MA 02111
Friday, August 12, 2011
Children’s Quarters 10:00-10:45
36 First Avenue (Charlestown Navy Yard), Charlestown, MA 02129
John F. Kennedy Family Service Center 11:15-12:00
23 Moulton Street, Charlestown, MA 02129
Charlestown Library 1:15-2:00
179 Main Street, Charlestown, MA 0212
" [with the game] BioShock, the developer Irrational Games...is... "testing the
limits of the ultraviolent gaming genre with a strategy that enables
players to kill characters resembling young girls." The game presents an
ethical choice to players, whether to kill 'Little Sisters' for extra
abilities or save them and receive less."
Dear Justice Scalia:
I hope your mother is not alive to hear the latest nonsense you delivered from the bench. Were you raised by wolves-or what ? Are you *pazzo?
Me, I got to wonder if you have actually seen ( or Saw) or played a video game or recently read a fairy tale? ( I have a few highlights of some great games below). You may say and even believe that that the violence in video games is protected speech. Fair enough. I mean, getting extra points for killing a prostitute after you have sex with her ( as featured in older versions of Grand Theft Auto ) is not only protected by the First Amendment, it is the American Way. That's just like the evil stepsisters having their eyes pecked out as in some classic versions of Cinderella - right?
Wrong.
Saying that the violence in video games is like violence the Brothers Grimm fairy tales is simply bone-headed. First, the violence in a folk or fairy tale has some context and reason embedded the plot or the social context of the listeners. Second, in fairy tales, there is always a resolution to the violence. Yes, innocents are often irrationally and violently victimized, but the guilty are always punished. And sure, a person could read the gory parts of any fairy tale over and over again. Reading compulsively like that is not only unlikely it is distinctly different from the exciting simulation and repeated perpetration of violent acts upon others. Duh!
It must be exciting to pretend to rape and murder over and over again. I don't know. Me? I prefer to make pesto. But I assume the pleasure in dangerously anti-social patterns of behavior is why video games sell so well? But, let's not talk about what I think. Let's talk about you, the wise judge in the highest court of the land.
*Che fai? What are you doing down there? Beyond protecting business
interests, do you guys ever attend to or speak about moral considerations?
You did feel free to open your big mouth and talk about literature.
The issue of violent video games has social implications that deserve very careful
consideration. During WWII, the Nazis were the first to use repeated viewings of filmed violent acts to train and desensitize their concentration camp guards.
Just sayin'.
The First Amendment is one thing. I am a huge fan of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. But only a *citrull' could think that violent video games are harmless, or would compare them favorably to our valuable cultural heritage of oral narrative.
So, wise up, Antonin! What would your mother think? And say hello to your *fratello, Romulus for me.
Romulus and Remus were raised by a she-wolf until a kindly shepherdess took over. Due to their humble beginnings they grew up without an X-Box or cable.
2006 RapeLay PC Illusion Soft Rape forms a core part of the gameplay leading to controversy raised in the UK Parliament and elsewhere.
2006 Rule of Rose The mayor of Rome called for the game to be banned from Italy, saying children "have the right to be shielded from violence". The then European Union justice and security commissioner wrote an open letter condemning the game for "obscene cruelty and brutality". An Italian magazine, Panorama, claimed that in order to win the game players must bury a girl alive which the game's European publisher disputed. On the UK release day, the publisher announced that Rule of Rose would not be published in the UK, despite the game being approved for release by the Pan European Game Information (PEGI) and Video Standards Council regulatory bodies
2007 BioShock Xbox 360, PC, PS3 2K Games An article in The Patriot Ledger, the local paper of developer Irrational Games, argued that the game is "testing the limits of the ultraviolent gaming genre with a strategy that enables players to kill characters resembling young girls." The game presents an ethical choice to players, whether to kill 'Little Sisters' for extra abilities or save them and receive less. 2K president Ken Levine defended the game as a piece of art, stating "we want to deal with challenging moral issues and if you want to do that, you have to go to some dark places". Jack Thompson took issue with advertisements for the game appearing during WWE SmackDown's airtime, writing to the Federal Trade Commission and stating that M-rated games should not be advertised when large numbers of under-17s are watching.
2007 V-Tech Rampage PC This game simulated events from the 2007 Virginia Tech Shootings and has music targeting the RIAA
The Queen of Hyperbole is a title I wear easily. It fits. So when I say this has been the most intense and exhausting few months of my life, most people will "pooh-pooh" me. But it has. And I guess I have done things like this before? But it is impossible to remember. Which is likely why I do things like this over and over again. What is "this"? "This" is/was an epic project that cost me many more gray hairs, a dozen visits to PT for back problems and 6 to 7, 18 hour days a week.
This spring, from March 11th until April 15th, massmouth storyteller-educators taught the art of storytelling to high school students. The curriculum based, in class program was called, StoriesLive® Collectively, we have heard over 1,200 personal stories from high school juniors and seniors in Abington, Andover, Boston Latin Academy, Everett, Lynn Classical, and Newburyport high schools. The best of the stories heard in the classroom moved on to tell in front of a larger high school audience. The best of each high school competed on April 30th, 2011 for a share $5000 in scholarship cash. Prizes were awarded for any post-secondary educational endeavor as follows: $2,000 for the 1st place and $1000 each to 2 runners up. $500 to the Audience Choice winner. A $500 award was a discretionary prize from massmouth to any student in the program.
So here, at last, is a video - uneven in quality but unified in message, that has some of the highlights of StoriesLive®.
I am moving target these days...up and down Route 2, to and from Boston. Seeking internet connection in the boonies... Feeling a bit like the Red Queen from Lewis Carroll's, Through the Looking-Glass.
The Red Queen said, "Now, here you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that."
The Red Queen Principle can be stated thus: "For an evolutionary system, continuing development is needed just in order to maintain its fitness relative to the systems it is co-evolving with." Uh-huh. Well, whatever. Another way to say it might be that we are so busy we hardly have time to wipe our noses.
My favorite quote from The Red Queen is : "Sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." And at massmouth, we have sometimes done as many as six impossible things before breakfast. Lewis Carroll said the Red Queen was based on the quintessential British governess or teacher. If that is true, I often feel more like Tweedledummer than the Queen: "Contrariwise," continued Tweedledee, "if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic."
And as for my postings? Well, the Red Queen said it best: "It's too late to correct it," said the Red Queen: "when you've once said a thing, that fixes it, and you must take the consequences."
The postings have not kept up with our truly fantastic speed. Maybe that is a good thing, considering my pathetic typo to word count ratio ? As for impossible things, this month massmouth moved out of my bedroom, established an office, found funding to pay for the office for six months and just found an intern from Lesley University, who will work with us for college credit. One of our dreams come true! And massmouth also hosted 5 story fabulous story slams/events and a few workshops.
Inside the office...
So, on many days, rather than feeling like the Red Queen, I feel more like Alice: " Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for she had plenty of time as she went down to look about her and to wonder what was going to happen next."
Not the "off with yer head" gal, the other, more reasonable, equally bossy, monarch.
We spent a gorgeous afternoon with Nelson. Patti, Robert and I worked side by side and it felt great to be outside and working with wood under Nelson's gentle direction. Nelson is pretty deaf from working with a chain saw for 60 of his 86 years so my questions are loud. I recorded him by turning on my cell phone memo function and putting it in my pocket while we worked. The pics are all from my iPhone as well. Though I have been splitting wood for years this was my first time using a chain saw.
Nelson is 87 years old.
He is thoughtful and wicked funny.
Neslon said I would "starve" if I tried to earn a living cutting wood. He also said that he had "never burned oil" only wood. He does not miss a trick and he loves to tease us. He noticed that I was taking pictures - without actually looking up. He chided me to get the "beautiful side" of his handsome face. Later Nelson asked me when he sussed that I was up to more than just splitting and stacking wood, " Who is your media outlet? FOX or CNN?" We love getting to spend time with him. The little video below does not do him justice.
Checked out my tape and here is what I captured with my video cam set up. I adjusted to catch Eric and the rest of the tape has my head cut off - I sure needed a camera person.
We spent a gorgeous afternoon with Nelson. Patti, Robert and I worked side by side and it felt great to be outside and working with wood under Nelson's gentle direction. Nelson is pretty deaf from working with a chain saw for 60 of his 86 years so my questions are loud. I recorded him by turning on my cell phone memo function and putting it in my pocket while we worked. The pics are all from my iPhone as well. Though I have been splitting wood for years this was my first time using a chain saw.
