Mainly because I want to involve the audience in the story telling process and with any luck I can then become a less noticeable part of the process. With the audience facing each other and looking to each other as a group then they look to me less and the enjoyment becomes a shared process with people they usually know.

What I have observed of other storytellers, who work with the audience on one side only, is a need for performance; the concern being with delivery and mysticism of the storytelling process. The stories are told in hushed tones, the storyteller expecting a lot of attention from the audience and to my mind if it's not a very good story it all dissipates into the candle light and melts away with the moment.

When working with children and involving them in the storytelling process it becomes natural to turn a storytelling event into a tribal gathering a collective leaping and dancing wailing and gnashing of teeth. At times I walk away from such a session wondering if it was too chaotic but you can't look at such a session objectively after the moment has passed, it seemed to be right for those children at that time and with that story.

I was pleased to receive this letter from a teacher who booked me for a day's work. `It is great for them to take part in activities in which they can let go, as the curriculum now is so academic' and `their teachers are now being badgered to do the same kind of thing with them.' It's a common occurrence that teachers carry on working in the round creating plays with students after I've left a school .

I don't work with any more than forty-five children at a time as I work alone. It may make me less cost effective for a large booking but, as I insist in the literature I send out to schools, I do reach every child who wants to participate in that hour.