THE
FABULARIUM
Crick Crack Club
on Bankside
24.07.15
This
Festival of Fairytales for Grown-ups and Myths for Kids opened on the
rainiest day in July, in a massive “contemporary yurt” just by
the Oxo Tower.
The
first event features
that doyen of story-tellers, Ben Haggarty, with The Blacksmith at the
Bridge of Bones. It's
a quintessential story of master and disciple, good and evil,
supernatural skills and magical powers.
Haggarty
takes
us with him to a world of shape-shifting serpents, a wolf in a wheel,
golden legs and silver wings, towers and eagles, and a cold, coffined
bride woken with a kiss. And all brought back
at the end to the river Wye, just down the road from Haggarty's
Herefordshire home.
The
ancient art of story-telling is in the surest, safest hands here. He
uses mime – conjuring
the wolf, the spider's web out of thin air -
humour, repetition and surprise to hold his audience entranced for
almost an hour, weaving familiar elements - seven years, the power
of three [three white metals, three trials, three days] – into a
compelling narrative, craftily structured for the most satisfying
effect. Like children, we enjoy the familiar, love a clever
twist and a happy ending.
Direct
speech too – this man in black becomes the youthful hero [named
Jack,
naturally],
his widowed mother, the eponymous smith – a mighty man indeed –
and the sensual serpent queen with forked tongue.
As
the rain patters on the contemporary canvas roof, Haggerty introduces
his story, and warms up his audience, with a traditional Haiti
welcome. His listeners are divided into teachers and sleepers,
students and nuisances. All high-tech life support is banned, the
phones, the pods and the pads, the tweets and the twattering. The
spoken word rules, the imagination roams free, in a ritual exchange
as old as mankind itself.
This
pop-up extravanga continues, rain or shine, until August 2, with a
fine
roster of fabulatori
and different
tales every day.
