Northland Public Library in McCandless township (
map) will host the
2012 Three Rivers Storytelling Festival on August 10 and 11, which will include China's
Linda Fang on Saturday. The
McKnight Journal has
a profile:
Half a world away in China, Linda Fang learned of her storytelling talent as a child.
To break her shyness, a teacher had asked her to read a book and retell the story the next day.
As her shyness disappeared, she was treated as a "little teacher" at age 12 or 13 and allowed to tell stories to her classmates.
While she loves sharing with any audience, she especially enjoys children in the third grade and older.
"They'll accept anything I tell them," Fang, now of Rockville, Md., said.
What she brings to the classrooms or to festivals are bits of her culture in history, folk tales, proverbs and operas.
"Chinese is a language of stories," she explained.
Each character that makes up Chinese words gives it meaning.
Each has a story behind it. For example, the word "contradiction" is made up of the characters for "spear" and "shield," an obvious picture of contradiction.
You'll find
a schedule on the festival's website. Ms. Fang will also
hold a workshop on Saturday morning from 9:00 to 10:45, titled "Words that Tell a Story":
The Chinese language is a story language. Many words and phrases and proverbs come from stories. Linda will demonstrate how Chinese symbols (characters) are formed by strokes and the stories behind them. The participants will learn to use a Chinese brush pen to write Chinese characters. They will be encouraged to tell a story from their own language that eventually have now become a phrase or proverb. There is an added charge of $2/person to cover the cost of materials. Participants will keep their brush pens.
The cost is $37 per person, including the extra $2 charge.
