I LIKE to think of storytellers as modern-day rhapsodes – those who would memorise epic poems of ancient Greece and Rome and recite them to music. After all, it’s almost the same thing, isn’t it? Passing on tales usually told by ancestors, or stories of their lives or even myths and legends from folklore.

And myths and legends were exactly what I got at the Scottish Storytelling Centre.

First, in Táin, I learned an ancient Irish tale, teaching of the splitting of Ireland and of friends and foes forged in blood. A queen of Connacht hell-bent on retrieving a bull that brings nothing but bloodshed to Ulster. A bond between two boys destined to die by one another but tied together by a love that brings death by accident.

It’s a parable. Two men transforming into many creatures before settling as bulls, so enraged by one another that their deaths soak the blood into the soil. It’s far too similar to modern-day Irish splits to be anything less than the origin story of Ireland.

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Though an ancient tale we could learn from a quick Google search or a glance at a book, it was the storytellers that gave it light. When we learned of a boy who transforms into a monstrous creature, you could see the pouring of black blood from his head, you could hear the cawing of crows that form around him, you could feel the palpable terror from the queen’s army from performance alone.

However, a little niggle I had was the way the two would pass the story from one to the other made it seem a little too polished. What I find so compelling about these storytellers is the way they seem to tell the tales as though they’re reciting it from the top of their heads or making it up as they go along. The colour-changing lights, though effective in conveying the atmosphere, seemed almost too perfect.

I continued my exploration of myth and the art of storytelling with the tale of Medusa, in Do Not Look Away by Lily Asch (below) and Dimitris Kounatiadis. I know the story of Medusa, having taken classics in school, but I was intrigued to see how a storyteller would tackle it.

The set was even more stripped back than Táin. Instead of a circle of spotlights with an array of instruments and a stage, there were two chairs with a light illuminating it.

The only musical accompaniments were a drum and bells, used for the sound of waves, a beat behind Asch, the flutter of winged shoes, a drop at the more dramatic moments, the tweeting of birds.

We were asked to take a deep breath and cover our eyes. Imagine a statue. Perseus with the head of Medusa. The vivid descriptions made you almost able to reach out to touch the image in your mind’s eye. Feel the coolness of the copper. Marvel at the handiwork.

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It was an incredibly effective way of getting yourself in the headspace for the story.

Unlike the storytellers of Táin, Asch told the stories as though she was there – there’s almost an otherworldly essence about her – and though hours of research and practice must have been put into the performance, the narrative flows as though she’s recounting a family story.

We listened to the plight of Medusa as though she were in the room with us, a real woman instead of a fictional character. She fully encapsulated the rhapsodes of the time she clearly cares so much about.

Asch also retold the story in a way I’ve never considered. She placed blame on Athena, cruelly transforming Medusa into a hideous monster to punish her for being raped by Poseidon.

Asch points out that Athena was a goddess created by men for men. She dressed as a Spartan woman despite being patron of Athens. She was born of a man. She was a perfect virgin.

The story wasn’t perfect. A little too much audience participation made me think more of a classroom than a storyteller, and the order of the events being told could be better, but it’s what Asch brought to mind that made it stay with me.

Asch pointed out that Medusa is a tale that’s been changed with every iteration. She’s a symbol of fierceness in fashion, of the femme fatale in Hollywood, and more recently, of a way for survivors of sexual assault to find strength in.

In the modern day, when we see the plights of women, when we think of the Me Too movement, when we reconsider the outcome of Roe v Wade, we may find solace in the face of Medusa. The hideous symbol of a woman ripped from life and mistreated by men.

And when we look upon the face, we owe it to her and all the women she represents not to look away.