The Story Tree

The Story Tree Company was established by me (Jenni) to provide storytelling performances, workshops and recordings. The name came from an ancient fig tree which grows on Max's (my partner) inland property. It grows in a patch of semi-rainforest by a mostly dry creek bed. It has magnificent buttress roots, tangled hair roots that hang down form the... branches and mossy, mysterious alcoves. When the kids were quite young, we came to refer it as "The Story Tree". We would walk through the forest to it, play under it and sometimes, sit to tell stories under it. But strangely, for me at least, stories rarely came when we sat under the tree. The tree evoked mystery, wonder and silence, though sometimes ideas would well up days later. Once though I did make up a story about the origin of the story tree and later found similar folktales. When Max suggested the name Story Tree, I asked the people on my email list to vote on three choices: The Story Circle, The Story Tree and one other I've forgotten- I think it was Story Arts. The Story Tree Company won which was lucky, because by the time the vote came back I was completely-down- to-my-roots in love with the name Story Tree! 'Something is happening in the power and practice of story: in the midst of overwhelming noise and distraction, the voice of story is calling us to remember our true selves.' - Christina Baldwin, The StorycatcherRead More