I’m very excited to introduce my guest today - prolific author and mythteller Dr. Martin Shaw.
I first encountered Martin’s writing in the foreword to Stephen Jenkinson’s book Die Wise, and was immediately hooked by the elegant and unruly prose that leapt from the page. I found the same ecstatic spirit in Martin’s popular essays and numerous books including Scatterlings and the more recent Courting the Wild Twin.
Over the years, we’ve crossed paths at numerous teachings and locales, from a small island off the coast of British Columbia, to a 1000 year old pub near Dartmoor National Park in the UK, where he lives.
Martin has spent many years as a wilderness rites-of-passage guide, and honed his craft as a mythteller learning directly with the greats Robert Bly, James Hillman, and Michael Meade... among many others.
I knew that one day I needed to speak to Martin about his time in the mythopoetic men’s movement, alongside his teaching house Westcountry School of Myth- who are self-described as a “school of courtly love disguised as a monastery for elegant pirates.
In our interview today we discuss range of topics: from a bardic role of the mythteller, why we are in the underworld (but don’t know it yet), and how this time of coronavirus might be an invitation into our collective initiation.
LINKS
#13 | Gambling With the Knuckle Bones of Wolves - Martin Shaw (School of Myth)