Your cart is empty.
Gather - Richard Van Camp on the Joy of Storytelling

Gather

Richard Van Camp on the Joy of Storytelling

Paperback : 9780889777002, 162 pages, May 2021

Awards

  • Short-listed, Saskatoon Public Library Indigenous Peoples’ Publishing Award 2022
  • Winner, Northwords Book Award 2022

Description

Stories are medicine. During a time of heightened isolation, bestselling author Richard Van Camp shares what he knows about the power of storytelling—and offers some of his own favourite stories from Elders, friends, and family.

Gathering around a campfire, or the dinner table, we humans have always told stories. Through them, we define our identities and shape our understanding of the world.
 
Master storyteller and bestselling author Richard Van Camp writes of the power of storytelling and its potential to transform speakers and audiences alike.
 
In Gather, Van Camp shares what elements make a compelling story and offers insights into basic storytelling techniques, such as how to read a room and how to capture the attention of listeners. And he delves further into the impact storytelling can have, helping readers understand how to create community and how to banish loneliness through their tales. A member of the Tlicho Dene First Nation, Van Camp also includes stories from Elders whose wisdom influenced him.
 
During a time of uncertainty and disconnection, stories reach across vast distances to offer connection. Gather is a joyful reminder of this for storytellers: all of us.
 

Reviews

"Van Camp writes with the same sincerity and enthusiasm characteristic of his oral storytelling, using colloquial language and self-deprecating humour that invites readers to snuggle up and get cosy while the story unfolds on the pages." —Winnipeg Free Press

Praise for Van Camp:

“Stories and storytellers are an important part of what makes us human. Van Camp’s stories, whether they feature light comedy, family discord and reconciliation or his vivid images of the legendary Wheetago monsters, revived by global warming and horrifically hungry for human flesh, are gifts to the reader.” —Vancouver Sun
 
“Van Camp is…a brilliant weaver of tales.” —Quill & Quire