Nuit du conte (Storytelling Evening)
Artistic Creation through Francophone stories from the Americas and Africa
With the support of the Center for Francophonie in the Americas
March 2011 / as part of the Francophonie Month
Mimi Barthélémy (stories from the Greater Antilles)
Barry Jean Ancelet (Cajun stories of Louisiana)
Myriame El Yamani (stories from Acadia, Quebec and the Maghreb)
Bienvenu Bonkian (West African stories)
Haiti, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Guyana, Louisiana, Acadia, Quebec…all of these areas share the same French heritage. Their languages spring from French and their cultural values are often close and hint at closely related identities, as if they were all related.
The memory of these common histories has survived in written legends and through the oral storytelling tradition, following a common invisible thread, from the bawdy poems of the French Middle Ages to the Cajun stories of today and yesteryear, not to mention the tales of mythical Acadia.
For one evening, we are bringing together four important Francophone storytellers from the Americas and West Africa: Mimi Barthélémy, Myriame El Yamani, Barry Jean Ancelet and Bienvenu Bonkian.
Their voices will take turns blending stories of today and yesteryear from the Greater Antilles, Louisiana, Acadia, Quebec, Morocco and West Africa, bringing them to life before your eyes: stories of animals, the origins of the universe, “fabrications,” and popular tales full of earthy, symbolic characters and popular morals that are sprinkled here and there with colorful expressions.
Center for Francophonie in the Americas
The Center for Francophonie in the Americas promotes the development of a forward-looking Francophonie for the French language in the context of cultural diversity. It works to build, strengthen and enrich relationships and projects between Francophones and Francophiles from Quebec, Canada and the Americas.
Program
“Greater Antilles and Legendary Animals” by Mimi Barthélémy
These stories are from the great islands of the Caribbean and evoke the ties between these islands and mythical animals. At first, the Caribbean islands were pearls floating on the blue sea. Over time, the pearls were molded to take the shape of, for example, a caiman, a crab, a hummingbird, a butterfly or an angry sea-monster.
“A Trip between Land and Sea” byMyriame El Yamani
Take a trip to the end of the Saint Lawrence River where an “island of feelings” took refuge, where “Jean of the Moon,” the lighthouse keeper on the North Coast, talked of stars and where a “line of flying booty” brought colors to Acadia’s houses. Accompany Myriame on some “round-about paths” to get to the Maghreb, where Badra, princess of the desert, and Aboud Kassem’s slippers await you.
“Tales and Legends from the Cajun World” by Barry Jean Ancelet
Jean the Bear and the king’s daughter, The Sow in the wheelbarrow, The Oldest of the Old, The Forgotten Language, The Beautiful Hunt without Rifles, The Accidental Trip to the Moon, Dry Up the Pacific to Plant Rice, and other stories and fabrications.
“Stories from West Africa” by Bienvenu Bonkian
Evening for all ages (12 and up)
Language: French, with touches of “Creole” and other “dialects”
Performance Length: 2:30 with intermissions
The evening performance could be extended to include a discussion in French with the audience, led by the four storytellers.
Workshops
During their visit, Myriame El Yamani and Mimi Barthélémy could give introductory workshops on oral expression, public speaking, story writing, and collective creation of stories. For students, French teachers and all audiences.
More specific information on these workshops will be provided upon request.
The Performers
Mimi Barthélémy
Mimi Barthélémy was born in Port-au-Prince, Haïti. After post-secondary studies in France, she lived in Latin American, Sri Lanka and North Africa.
Her path towards storytelling has been linked to her personal quest for identity as a Haitian woman living outside of her country. This search has led her to undertake a long project on the voice, thanks to which she found a way to express her recollections.
In her stories, she weaves together two languages – French and Creole – in the desire to pass on what she has inherited and to bear witness to this heritage within the French-speaking world.
She develops and presents performances which reflect the two main threads of her research:
- the encounter, in theatrical form of stage writing and the oral tradition, of the reminiscence of a personal story, History and fiction;
- work on the Haitian tradition of stories through song, aspiring to the development of a new type of musical story.
In 1998, her interest in artistic encounters led her to participate in a collective performance “Ainsi soient-elles” with five other female storytellers and to act in “Mistero Buffo Caraïbe,” based on the work of Dario Fo and staged by Dominique Lurcel.
In 2000, she was awarded the rank of Knight in the National Order of Merit and in 2001 the rank of Officer in the Order of Arts and Letters.
Barry Jean Ancelet
This Francophone Cajun from Louisiana, who holds a doctorate in Creole Studies, is currently director of the Center for Cajun and Creole Folklore at the University of Louisiana. He has given hundreds of lectures and published numerous articles and works, distributed in the United States, on various aspects of the French community in Louisiana and Cajun music and folklore, including an anthology of French literature in Louisiana and a dictionary of Louisiana French.
He participated in creating alternative methods for teaching French in its full diversity and producing over fifty disks of Cajun and Creole music.
A consultant and researcher for more than sixty films and television programs, Barry Ancelet shares his passion through festivals (including the Acadian and Creole Festivals that he helped to found in 1974 and which he still directs), concerts, exhibitions, documentary films and radio programs.
He received the Academic Palmes and was decorated with the insignia of the Order of Arts and Letters in France, and the Order of North American Francophones of Quebec.
Myriame El Yamani
A nomad in her soul and also literally, Myriame El Yamani has roamed around several continents in quest of a crossbreeding of humanity’s cultures and dreams.
She brings back unique sounds and images that she shares passionately. As someone who has been first a journalist, then a movie critic, researcher, speaker, instructor, coordinator, storyteller and writer, speech is central to her life.
Born in Morocco of a Moroccan father and a French mother, Myriame El Yamani has lived in Quebec and Acadia for 25 years. She draws her inspiration from memories of people she has known, the salt-water smells of Acadia, today’s multi-ethnic Montreal, the secrets of her grandmother from La Vendée and her Yemeni grandfather, the colors and arabesques of the Maghreb, African wisdom and the mysteries of the Mediterranean.
Myriame El Yamani has told stories at numerous festivals in Quebec, New Brunswick and France and has completed several stints as a storyteller and writer in residence in Europe. Since 2001, she has conducted more than 600 workshops in Canada and France with primary and secondary-school audiences and has served as a mentor for younger storytellers.
She founded and directed the International Festival of Storytelling and Speech in Acadia (FICPA) from 2002 through 2007, and she is president of the International Storytelling House in Montreal which she founded in 2006.
Bienvenu Bonkian
Bienvenu Bonkian is a Burkinabe actor, singer, poet, dancer, and musician, who was forced to move away from the theatre due to ophthalmological problems, thus cutting short a very promising career.
This young man’s determination, however, helped him to overcome a stroke of bad luck which has destroyed many others.
He refused to be shut in the eternal darkness of the visually impaired and retrained himself to work in storytelling, a genre which, unlike the theatre, does not require moving around or collaborating with several actors on a stage.
For years, he has been a storyteller on stage at home and abroad. He draws on the animals of the savannah and evokes, by sheer force of his voice, a fabulous world where hyenas, hares and chimpanzees take on human qualities and flaws, in a criticism of human society. He also organizes workshops and develops performances for school children.
Links
Mimi Barthélémy :
http://www.mimibarthelemy.com
http://ma-tvideo.france2.fr/video/iLyROoafI54_.html
Barry Jean Ancelet :
http://apfd.louisiana.edu/endowed/Ancelet-Barry.shtml
Myriame El Yamani :
www.myriameelyamani.com
www.maisoninternationaleduconte.com
Bienvenu Bonkian :
http://www.lefaso.net/spip.php?article22414
Center for Francophonie in the Americas:
http://www.francophoniedesameriques.com/
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