Bards become storytelling world record holders

Two bards have officially become world record holders after taking part in a marathon international storytelling event.

Maxwell and Lisa Goodwin, both 54 from Glastonbury, were two of more than 100 storytellers to perform over the 80-hour effort in Marrakech at the end of January.

As well as taking part in the record-breaking event, the pair – both of whom bring their talents to Glastonbury Festival each year – also travelled to schools around Morocco telling stories.

“When you listen to a great story, whether it’s ancient or brand new, it is a break from the norm,” said Mr Goodwin.

“You are transported for that moment into another world entirely which is the power of stories,” he added.

Mr Goodwin told BBC Radio Somerset he had come to storytelling through his love of the game Dungeons and Dragons, which involved creating your own interactive storyline.

“You can take any mythology or any old story or new story or science fiction story and lay a very complicated or very simple story around it for other people to interact with,” he said.

Ms Goodwin, a keen poet, came to the practise through a different route. In 2013 she entered a competition in Glastonbury to become a ‘chaired bard’ of the town and – to her “surprise” – won.

Both storytellers told the BBC how Marrakech and its surrounds as a rich source of inspiration, with Mr Goodwin describing the city as “full of magic”.

“You trip over history here,” he said. “Marrakesh is exactly the same.”

The city plays host to a biannual international storytelling festival, which this year welcomed more than 100 performers from 33 countries.

The Guinness World Record-breaking event featured stories in two languages native to the country, as well as a range of languages around the world which, in line with the strict rules of the attempt, could not be translated in real time.

“You can listen to a story in another language and take a lot from it,” said Mr Goodwin. “Storytellers are obviously quite expressive people as well, there’s a lot of movement and theatrics going on alongside the actual words which is always fun.”

This was not the case in the storytelling sessions in schools around the Marrakech area, with translators allowing Mr and Ms Goodwin telling their stories directly to local children.

“Story manages to affect the larger social structure,” Ms Goodwin said. “You’ve got this huge diversity of people coming from around the world, but not only did we create this magnificent achievement between us of creating a world record, but we went into 200 schools and stories were told to 5,000 children.

“That’s where I found my inspiration.”