Month: May 2013

  • The Pentamerone: Part 1

    The Pentamerone is a collection of fifty folk tales written by Giambattista Basile in the Neopolitan dialect. It’s based on oral stories he collected while he was traveling around Venice, Crete and wherever he’d find people who would tell him a tale. It’s a phenomenal collection, containing just about every major motif of the European…

  • The Drama Instructor

    There’s a story I’ve heard about a drama instructor. He was berating his students one day for failing to grasp the most basic points of theatre. “You!” He said to one of his students. “Walk onto that stage, say ‘Look at that moon!’ and point upwards.” And the student did. And when she had finished,…