Events
Bard Events are an opportunity to experience Myth. They are participative and interactive. They are an opportunity to hear again the story in the Oral tradition, in the time honored way.
There is the opportunity to get to know the individual characters in the myth, to experience them and how they look at the world. We often then have the characters dialogue with each other. These exercises enrich the understanding of the Archetypes of the Myth.
Because the meaning and richness of myth is often hidden below the surface of the story, there are opportunities to probe and delve. There are many great ways to dig beneath the surface of the myth and each in its way offers insight and richness. In the way that a Cubist painting is one where the same thing is seen from many angles we might say that the style of the Bard is Cubist.
The Bard Events always bring speakers whose role is to enrich and deepen the myth from their particular perspective. The events usually have a poet who is always a welcome guest at the table. But these inputs are always a compliment to the primary ‘Myth Work’ which is what the participants do.
The ‘Myth Work’ is to harrow, to harrow the myth that has been experienced, probed, analysed. The harrowing means that we have asked ‘how does this myth serve us today?’ and do we need to let it go, re-embrace or retell it as part of crafting a sustainable mythology or rather a mythology for a sustainable world.
The longer Bard Events also include visits to local historical or mythological sites. The social side obviously includes storytelling. On Clare Island, the Islanders treat us to a storytelling evening of song, dance, poetry, drama, from young and old. Music, singing, satire, also play a big role, especially at the feast. For many, the feast, is the highlight of the Event with the decorated room, the table laden with the best from land and sea.
For more detailed information on current and past events see Events Archive
