<<<Back to main Resources Page.
The Great Transition Stories project described in chapter 7 intends to gather, understand, and share the great, simple, emotionally powerful stories that describe our human journey and call higher human potentials from us. This project was conceived and directed by Duane Elgin (duaneelgin.com) in partnership with Lynnaea Lumbard (newstories.org) and Jeff Vander Clute. They are most fully expressed at the Great Transition Stories wiki (greattransitionstories.org).
Mythopoetic Storytelling is a catalyst for facing our world, and several resources for contacting ancient and new stories are worth sharing.
Mosaic Multicultural Foundation (mosaicvoices.org) was founded by storyteller, author, and scholar of mythology, anthropology, and psychology Michael Meade whose books, blog posts and podcasts, combine hypnotic storytelling and street-savvy perceptiveness, and connect them to the stories we are living today.
Martin Shaw (drmartinshaw.com)—founder of The Westcountry School of Myth (schoolofmyth.com)—is a mythologist, author, and “one of the greatest storytellers we have” according to Robert Bly. He resurrects ancient fairy tales like the tale of the lindwurm’s bride recounted in Chapter 7, and delivers them as initiations for facing the mysterious challenges of our time.
The Great Mother and New Father Conference (greatmotherconference.org) was begun in 1975 by Robert Bly. Its website says“Story has a way of getting into the nervous system of the entire conference over the week. It brushes elbows with ritual, influences the food we eat and when we eat it, supports the work of poetry, activism, and art…”
The Dark Mountain Project (dark-mountain.net) is “a network of writers, artists and thinkers who have stopped believing the stories our civilization tells itself”. They feel they see that the world is entering an age of ecological collapse, material contraction and social and political unravelling, and they want their cultural responses to play a crucial role in coming to terms with this this reality rather than denying it. The Dark Mountain Manifesto lay down the gauntlet, and now the project publishes regular anthologies of “uncivilized” writing in carefully-crafted 300-page hardback books that showcase radical essays, fiction, non-fiction, poetry, art “and various uncategorizable things.”