Oral History Program Ed Stivender Interviewed by Kandice Harris 18 March 2021 Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Ed Stivender Interviewed by Kandice Harris 18 March 2021 Copyright © 2022 by Weber State University, Stewart Library iii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. The working files, original recording, and archival copies are housed in the University Archives. Project Description The WSU Storytelling Festival was implemented by the Friends of the Stewart Library in 1992. The library sponsored and managed the annual festival until 1998, when the festival was moved to the Department of Teacher Education, with the Library continuing as a sponsor. The three-day festival entails storytellers from all over the nation, including youth storytellers. The events are made up of workshops and presentations, a fund-raising banquet, and a wrap-up of wonderful stories from gifted performers. This interesting collection includes oral history interviews with visiting storytellers, discussing how they became interested in storytelling and where they receive their inspiration. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management This work is the property of the Weber State University, Stewart Library Oral History Program. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Stivender, Ed, an oral history by Kandice Harris, 18 March 2021, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. Ed Stivender Circa 2015 1 Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Ed Stivender conducted on March 18, 2021, via Zoom, by Kandice Harris. Ed discusses his life, his experiences during his storytelling career, and his memories of the Weber State University Storytelling Festival. KH: Hello, my name is Kandice Harris today is March 18th, it is 8 o'clock in the morning. And I'm with Ed Stivender. How did you become interested and involved with Storytelling? ES: Well, first of all, I should make a distinction that there are two kinds of storytelling that underlies our conversation today. One is kitchen table at home storytelling and the other is so called "platform storytelling". Platform storytelling is when a storyteller stands with a microphone in front of a large audience and does some kind of thing. Kitchen table storytelling happens in the home and it's what happens naturally around the table. As a table storyteller, I've been telling stories since I first complained to my mother that I was hungry. And then growing up, on a Sunday, my father would say, "Well Eddie, would you like to play your harmonica or do a little story?" And I would perform for the family around the dining room table on a Sunday. My sister and I used to set up a clothesline in the backyard with a sheet across it and do performances of fairytales for our neighbors. Talking about platform storytelling, I think that it happened in 1977 when I went on my own. After teaching high school religion for about five years at West Hartford, Connecticut, where I told bible stories and learned how to keep a class's attention with storytelling, I joined up with the Plum Cake Players 2 Children's Theater for two years, and went on my own in 1977. At the Hartford Folk Festival I met Connie Reagan and Barbara Freeman, wonderful storytellers who were performing as The Folktellers. They went from place to place, all up and down the east coast and over the country, telling stories in librarian workshop settings. And they were librarians themselves; they were featured at the Hartford Folk Festival. I went to see them, introduced myself after, told them that I was a storyteller with the Children's Theater, they came to see my show and they told me about the Jonesborough Storytelling Festival. I went down in 1976 to see that wonderful festival and in 1980, Barbara and Connie, who were on the board of directors of that festival, invited me to be a featured teller at the Jonesborough Festival. That's really where I began my professional storytelling career and started touring through the country. And since then I've been able to go to storytelling festivals in Indonesia, and Austria, and New Zealand, and most of the festivals in the United States. Including this wonderful festival at Weber State University. KH: Great. What part of storytelling brings you the most joy and satisfaction? ES: The audience. In third grade, Sister Patrick Mary invited me to be in the St. Patrick's Day Play in which I found out about the wonderfulness of an audience. At the end of the show, we all took our bows and I heard applause for the first time, and I realized that there was something going on between me and the audience that was very special. As a solo storyteller, my greatest joy is participating in the dance--the dance of the imagination between the storytellers mind and the audience’s mind. The audience is one organic whole. When you 3 have a good audience paying attention to your work, it's almost like dancing with a good dance partner. A sensitive partner who responds to your cues and you respond to that person's cues. And that relationship, the dance between the imagination of the storyteller and the imagination of the audience, that's where I get the most fun— the greatest joy in storytelling. Going around the world is okay. The problem is that to do storytelling in other parts of the world, you have travel a long time. And it's not so much fun to travel. But, you travel to get to wherever the audience is. But that relationship between me and the audience is my favorite aspect of storytelling. And in a way, the audience helps you sculpt the story. When I have a new story and I go to a new audience and present the story, I trust the audience to give me feedback about how the story is going in their laughter, or their pauses, or their shifting in their seats. They give me hints and cues about the story that I'm telling. And that relationship, which is a dance, also is a sculpting aspect of forming stories into their final formation. And that's my favorite part of the storytelling moment. KH: What are the qualities of a good storyteller? ES: That's a good question. One aspect is patience. Patience in waiting for a phone call to come to invite you to a place where storytelling would take place. Another important aspect is sensitivity to the audience. In a Quaker Meeting “with a concern for Business”, they try to reach consensus or sense of a meeting where everyone agrees on whatever it is that is being discussed. A storyteller must get the sense of the meeting of the audience. So sensitivity to the audience to how the audience is responding is one aspect of being a storyteller. So patience, 4 sensitivity. I think it's important to have a voice that people can hear. Some people are a little bit shy of their voices. In the old days, we were told to as an actor, to reach the person in the back of the room, with the loudest voice you could make. So having a good voice is a good thing. Having a physical sense of presenting the story physically—and much of my work is physical—is an important thing. There are other aspects of what makes a good storyteller having to do with sense of presentation. When I go on the stage and present to an audience, I always dress in a way to honor the audience. Not every storyteller wears a tie. Whenever I'm on stage, I wear a tie. That's a way of honoring the audience, of communicating to the audience that this is a special occasion and I'm dressed to meet you, to be with you. I think it's good to be flexible. A storyteller who is flexible doesn't get thrown by technical problems. In fact, one of the things I love the best about being in a live storytelling is when a technical problem occurs, how to deal with that technical problem and improvisationally respond to whatever the problem is. It’s part of the joy of that dance of that improvisatory dance that you have. So flexibility is an important thing. When a storyteller makes a mistake, covering a mistake is part of the joy for a good storyteller. Being thrown by a mistake and allowing a mistake to mess up your entire set or your entire day is a very dangerous thing. So flexibility on stage, being quick on one's feet is an important aspect of storytelling. KH: Great. What elements are required for a good story? ES: This is a good question, Kandice. I have a kind of theory about what makes up a good story. The first thing in a good story is the setting. The storyteller has to 5 tell what the setting is. I like to think of this as the "unh-huh", where the audience hears what the storyteller is saying and imagines in their imagination the setting for the story. The next thing a story needs is some kind of trouble. Donald Davis—a wonderful storyteller from North Carolina--says that if there's no trouble, there's no story. And so I think of the next thing that happens is a kind of tension. There's an, "Uh oh," moment. There's, ‘unh-huh” the set up and then, "uh oh", somethings going to happen. And then there might be a moment of, "Yikes!" Something really bad is going to happen and then there's a surprise. Which I call the "Whoa" moment. And then, hopefully, there's some kind of humor in a good story. And I call this the, "ha ha" moment. And then there's a resolution, which I call the "phew!" moment. Where you've come from a setting, then there's been trouble, then there's been surprises, maybe some humor, and then at the end there's a, "phew!", and then finally the audience is allowed to get back to, "Unh-huh". "Unh-huh" at the beginning was, “Unh-huh, here's the setting." And "Unh-huh" at the end is, "Well, we're all back to where we were when we started and my life is going to continue, hopefully with some possibility and some potential for hope, having experienced this from the stage." Or around the kitchen table. So those are aspects of a good story. Now, what about lessons? Some people say that all stories must have a lesson and in fact, a fable is a kind of story which normally has a lesson. Aesop’s Fable sometimes has at the end of it a moral, "The moral of this story is..." Stories might have a lesson, but if there is a lesson, the lesson must come from the fabric of the story as it exists. I have seen storytellers tell stories which they 6 decide somewhere along the line the story is not politically correct. And so they will change the story and tweak the story and come up with a lesson which doesn't come from the fabric of the story, but which is pasted on the end of it. This is an aspect of perhaps, modern storytelling, which is problematic for me because at the end of the story, if the storyteller has to say what the lesson is, then they probably have not had the lesson within the story. And then changing a story in order to meet current or contemporary needs of order and political correctness is another difficulty. A lesson might be in the story, but the lesson must come from this structure, the fabric of the story and not be pasted on. Some stories may not have any lesson at all. And that's a possibility. So lesson is a tricky thing. KH: Do you think our current pandemic environment has an impact on the importance of storytelling? ES: I think the pandemic does have an impact on storytelling. Although, I'm not sure it has an impact on the importance of storytelling. The importance of storytelling in civilization is probably a constant. Storytelling has always been important. Storytelling is how we learn about our culture, how we accept realities of our culture, storytelling is how we learn our faith, how we accept the concepts of our faith. Storytelling is at the center of human existence. So the pandemic hasn't changed the importance of storytelling, but it has changed the structure of storytelling. And this is where it gets a little bit tricky. Earlier in this interview, I talked about family kitchen table storytelling and platform storytelling. One of the good things about the pandemic is that it has made kitchen table storytelling— 7 families around the table, talking to one another—more common and more wonderful because we are not going out. And we do have time to be together. If we spend the time that we have together on electronic video games and distractions from the persons that we live with, that's an unfortunate thing. If the pandemic allows us to spend more time with our families, find out about the family history, find out about the relatives and stories that our parents have and stories that our brothers and sisters have, that's a wonderful aspect of the pandemic. Now, on the level of platform storytelling, where a storyteller stands in front of an audience and does a presentation, and that dance between the live storyteller and the live audience occurs, the pandemic has made a big change in that kind of storytelling. And we storytellers are trying to adapt to that change with lesser or greater success. The idea of standing in a small studio that I've built in a room of this house, with a camera and a computer and lights et cetera, and telling a story to the eye of a webcam is much different than telling a story to people who are sitting in front of me. One aspect of that is that that webcam camera does not really know how to laugh. That webcam camera doesn't get my jokes, but the hardest part is that webcam camera doesn't allow me to cover for my mistakes. When I make a mistake in front of a live audience, covering the mistake and adapting the story so that it sounds like I didn't make a mistake is part of the joy of it. The webcam does not understand me covering my mistakes. The webcam just says, "That's a mistake." And then the question of what to do about that mistake is a whole different question. So the pandemic has 8 affected the kitchen table storytelling in a positive way and it has affected the live platform storytelling interaction between the audience and the storyteller in a more difficult way. But some of us are trying to adapt and learn how to do it. There's a wonderful storyteller by the name of Don White who does a performance every Thursday night. You should look up this guy, Don White, on the web. Don White, he does a performance at eight o'clock eastern time every Thursday night. And what he does with a Zoom performance is allow some of the people in the audience to be unmuted so that he can hear the laughter of some chosen people in the audience. And he has gone a long way to solve this issue. But there is nothing like a live audience in front of a storyteller who is having the joy of being together. And I think people will be looking forward to Weber's 26th Storytelling Festival, which hopefully will have live audiences. Now, will we ever have storytelling without the webcam? Will we ever have storytelling again without live streaming? I don't think so. I think that live streaming is with us for the rest of this century. And that's at least eighty more years in this century, 79 more years in this century. And I think that many festivals are going to be hybrid festivals where they will have some live with a live audience and some streamed, perhaps streamed of live audience performance. But I think we are going to have the pandemic result of the live stream webcam with us for some time, which I don't know if there is a way out of that. But I do prefer live people being in the same room as I am. One other thing, I have a suspicion that part of the connection between a live storyteller and an audience has to do with pheromones, subliminal 9 endocrinological emissions between everybody in a room, and there is something going on that we really can't point to. But I know for sure that the pheromones of joy and tragedy do not go through a webcam. That's a science that I don't have anything to back up. Maybe Dr. Fauci, when he's finished this current thing, can look at those current aspects of pheromones are. But that's for another time. KH: Where do you see storytelling in the future? ES: I think it's going to be virtual. There's no way out of virtual storytelling. One good thing about the virtual storytelling is that it allows for more people to be involved in hearing stories than would be involved if the storytelling was in one place. This 25th anniversary Festival is an amazing thing. There are 60 storytellers going on for 25 days and that's reaching who knows? It could be worldwide. A person on the other side of the world can receive the wonderful storytelling that's going on in this year's virtual Storytelling Festival at Weber State University Storytelling Festival 25th anniversary. That's one aspect which will not change, that will be with us for a long time, and that's a wonderful thing. Also in this regard, is that there are more possibilities for storytellers to present their stories. When the pandemic set in, at the very beginning, people panicked and said, "Oh no, there will never be storytelling again." But then, some individuals with a sharp eye said, "No, let's try it. Let's try the Zoom." And why I didn't buy stock in Zoom two years ago, is a mystery to me. But that's another question. A woman named Sheila Arnold for instance, developed with Donna Washington, an organization called ASST, which can be pronounced, 10 "Assist". And they have storytelling on Zoom several times a month. That structure allows storytellers who would not have a chance to be featured at Weber State University Storytelling Festival to show their skills in a setting which is less threatening than a big audience that you're not used to. So one of the things that's happening in the storytelling movement is that there are many more people telling stories actively, in front of webcams, through Zoom, and other kinds of live streaming, than ever before. More people are doing it, more people are hearing it, and that's a positive aspect in some ways. KH: Great. How long have you been involved in WSU's Storytelling Festival? ES: For some reason, they invited me to come to the first one. It may be that spies from Weber State University showed up in Jonesborough and saw me dancing with the audience. Or it may be that spies from Weber State University came to the Timpanogos Storytelling Festival in Orem, Utah and said, "Oh, here's a guy that looks like he might be good because he's entertaining the audiences." By spies, I don't mean evil people, I mean great people. Great people who have allowed me to go from place to place. And for some reason I was invited for the first storytelling festival. Since then, I have been invited several times and it's been a great pleasure to come. And it was a really serious honor to be invited to the 25th Weber State Storytelling Festival, which is going to be finishing up today, as a matter of fact. It may be that your viewers of this archive won't be able to see it live, but I suspect there might be ways for people on the inside to be able to retrieve some of the wonderful storytelling that's been going on. And I have been seriously enjoying watching the storytellers—60 storytellers— 11 including many talented children. I am amazed watching these children, with such aplomb, present their stories. Many of which they have written, that's the other thing about it - to cameras, with help from silent audiences, which might include their parents and maybe their teachers, it's not clear. It's been wonderful to watch the creativity that flashes out of the eyes of these children. And there are four so called, "professional storytellers", and then there are so called, "regional storytellers". Watching the regional storytellers, some of whom have been doing it for years and years as a profession, is another great delight. And watching their performances. Whenever I watch a storyteller, I learn from the storyteller just by watching. So I have had a great time learning how to tell stories from the regional professional storytellers, as well as these brilliant children. It's really been a great fun that way. So the pandemic and the virtual storytelling that's been going on, has allowed for much more storytelling to occur, much more storytelling to be developed in home studios or living rooms, and much more storytelling to be seen in living rooms, on various devices. Including devices that you can hold in your hand, well, you know more about that than I do. KH: I don’t know about that. What are some of your favorite memories from the festival? ES: The first word that comes to my mind when I think of this festival, from the very first moment, is hospitality. I am sorry, I cannot remember the name of the person that was my host at the very first storytelling festival. And at least one other festival. I can see her face, and I remember the tone of our being 12 together. She was a really lovely host and she made me feel like I was part of her family. She brought me to the house and met the family and had some snacks, and dinner I think. So hospitality of that individual and the hospitality of other individuals over the next 24 years. The hospitality of Ann Ellis, the gentle brilliance of Ann Ellis who I think of as the person who developed this festival in a way that was very special. And the care that Ann Ellis had over the whole thing, and the care that I felt from Ann Ellis for me in particular. The last time we had a live festival, I remember having a wonderful conversation in the audience after one of the scenes, after one of the shows. And it was so sweet to see the continuity that Ann Ellis has given. During that festival a couple of years back, the hospitality sense of DeeDee Mower and her husband was really wonderful. We had breakfast every morning at the hotel and the kind of support and hospitality from DeeDee and Ann have been central to my experiences. The invitation to present to the department of education, an academic paper, sort of, was another amazing thing. I developed a presentation by invitation, of Jack Stories and different motif of a Jack Story would work. I was honored to be able to do it and that was a really wonderful thing. Other aspects of hospitality is these delicious lunches, I can't think of the name of the restaurant, but they were very formal lunches with delicious food and then there were dinners at, I don't know. I'm sorry, I didn't do research before so I could name these wonderful restaurants. But, last time it was like a great formal restaurant with meat. I mean serious beef and it was really wonderful. I am a meat eater, as opposed to some of my storytelling friends who are vegan in order to save the earth. I'm not so 13 much interested in saving the earth when I tell stories as I am in giving the audience a break. I'm getting off the topic here, but different storytellers have different intentions. Some want to get the audience to be political, some want them to learn about the environment, some to reach enlightenment, etc. I just want to give people a break. That's my own intention in my storytelling. Anyway, the hospitality that had been shown. The other thing about this storytelling festival at Weber is the outreach that it does, and also the inreach. The numbers of children who have been bussed to the various sites of the storytelling festival is just amazing. The first time I came, I think it was in tents, it was outside in tents, and it was a little bit damp. But it didn't stop the children from coming in on busses and filling these tents and then filling the Egyptian Theater. Oh, that's another thing, the Egyptian Theater. What a wonderful venue, it was like being cast back into 50 years ago and coming into a gorgeous movie theater to do my little schtick with wonderful tech at the Egyptian Theater. So that was another aspect of the storytelling festival. Hospitality, the challenge of being in an academic setting, the outreach of this festival, the number of children who come to this festival, and now the amazing broadcast of the festival into homes all over the world really. And the fact that it's free, is just amazing. There is a possibility to give donations for people who watch, but there's not a charge at the door. So these are some of the wonderful memories I have of this incredible festival. And the complexity this year, I mean 25 days with four storytellers every day. And then the fact that it was consecutive. That the first day was great. You look on the schedule, day one, day two, day three, you see day one. On day one you 14 show up, you click on day one, then you look at day two, and it says, "to be announced "or "Coming soon,” and it was so sweet to have a reason to come back to the website every day, until today, which is the 18th, and you can see all of the stories, from the first day, February 22nd till the 25th day, March 18th. So the complexity of the festival and the technical skills that have allowed this festival to exist are pretty amazing to me. So I think that might be some of the memories I have. All of them, really wonderful memories. KH: Great. Those are all of the questions I have, is there anything else you'd like to share? ES: Just my thanks, my amazement to be invited back to the 25th festival. Another aspect of the festival is meeting people. Meeting Sam Payne, I'm sure that the viewers know who Sam Payne is. Meeting Sam Payne here at the first festival was a very fine thing. And watching Sam Payne and watching his skill, the lad has got chops as we say in the music business. And it's always a pleasure to watch him and my colleagues this year of Motoko and Simon Brooks. This has been a great time. And the so called regional tellers, some of whom have been doing storytelling longer (and better) than me. And from whom I’ve learned a lot about content and presentation and style. Every time I watch a storyteller, I learn. And I've been learning from my peers of this storytelling festival and the kids. Oh man, the timing of the kids is just brilliant. Yeah, I'm sure I'm leaving personalities out and names, I'm so terrible with names. But, oh, I'd like to thank Dr. Byrd, he was the main contact we had, and Nicholas Lambert and his 15 technical staff who made the videos so wonderfully, and the Education Department for inviting me. ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW AGREEMENT This Interview Agreement is made and entered into this _____18th______ day(s) of ___March 2021________, by and between the Weber State University, Stewart Library Oral History Program (WSUSLOHP) and_______Ed Stivender___________________, hereinafter called "Interviewee." Interviewee agrees to participate in a recorded interview, commencing on or about __10:00am (EDT), March 18, 2021_______time/date, with_____Kandice Harris_______. This Interview Agreement relates to any and all materials originating from the interview, namely the recording of the interview and any written materials, including but not limited to the transcript or other finding aids prepared from the recording. In consideration of the mutual covenants, conditions, and terms set forth below, the parties hereby agree as follows: 1. Interviewee irrevocably assigns to WSUSLOHP all his or her copyright, title and interest in and to the interview. 2. WSUSLOHP will have the right to use and disseminate the interview for research, educational, and other purposes, including print, present and future technologies, and digitization to provide internet access. 3. Interviewee acknowledges that he/she will receive no remuneration or compensation for either his/her participation in the interview or for the rights assigned hereunder. 4. WSUSLOHP agrees to honor any and all reasonable interviewee restrictions on the use of the interview, if any, for the time specified below, as follows: ________________________________________________ Interviewer and Interviewee have executed this Interview Agreement on the date first written above. INTERVIEWEE INTERVIEWER EdStivender__________________________________ (Signature) ________________________________ (Signature) _____EdStivender_________________________ (Printed Name) ________Kandice Harris________________ (Printed Name)