They look at us from the height of their age, and yet we keep repeating their mistakes. The characters in the tales are much closer to us than we think. And this is what the five competitors of the second edition of Combat des contes, of the Montreal Intercultural Festival of Tales, are preparing to defend.
Take the owner, into the tale The farmer and his owner, worn by storyteller François Lavallée. Manon Massé, spokesperson for Québec solidaire, is participating in this fight for the first time this year. For her, this tale, where an owner refuses to allow the farmer to use a piece of land to feed his starving cow, is perfectly embodied today, in the context of the tense relations between tenants and owners of Montreal, by force. evictions and rent increases.
“This tale is extremely topical,” says Manon Massé, in a short video posted online so that the public can themselves vote on the tales at stake. Because we are in situations where inequalities social are unacceptable. We realize that what we live, it was lived hundreds of years ago, and the oral tradition reminds us that the farmers and the tenants, we have a common history. That I think is precious. “
Next Sunday, Manon Massé will be at the Grande Bibliothèque to defend this tale, alongside four other fighters. Scientific popularizer Sophie Malavoy will defend the tale there Webbed feet, worn by Mike Burns. For her, the central issues of this tale are found in the wave of feminicides that is going through Quebec. “What we find in all feminicides are people who love too much and who don’t want the woman to leave. They will kill her rather than go with someone else. And it’s destructive. She [le personnage du conte] breaks free and she runs away, and that’s what I like. You can only love when you are ready to let go of the other, ”she says.
Contemporary relevance
The idea for this storytelling fight comes from the artistic director of the festival, Stéphanie Bénéteau. “I was inspired a little by the fight of the books of Radio-Canada, she says. We have chosen five tales from the repertoire which are not necessarily written somewhere, but which are told orally, according to their relevance, their artistic qualities and their capacity to move. Then, we found them five godfathers and godmothers who each defend one. The public will also be able to hear tales from the mouths of storytellers on October 30, at the Janine-Sutto cultural center.
The godfathers and godmothers were associated with their respective tales according to their interests and their field of activity. To Manon Massé and Sophie Malavoy is added the journalist Rima Elkouri, who is interested in immigration and interculturality and who will discuss the tale The story of the little hunchback, which is worn by Oro Anahory-Librowicz. “It’s a tale about the making of a scapegoat,” says Stéphanie Bénéteau. Anthropologist Gilles Bibeau will defend the Innu tale Summer birds, worn by Joséphine Bacon, and the way he reconnects us with nature. And the multidisciplinary artist Dulcinée Langfelder will appropriate the tale Amedee, which speaks of love and old age, and which is presented by Joujou Turenne.
Speaking of old age, this is the theme of the festival’s opening night. We expect in particular Michel Faubert and Marco Calliari, who will present the tale of Ovide Soucy, this old man who beats the devil in a drinking contest, but also, for example, Thierno Diallo, Senegalese storyteller, from a family storytellers from father to son, who also founded a storytelling festival in Dakar.
“We wanted to put on a show that would honor grandparents and transmission,” says Stéphanie Bénéteau, who wonders at the same time whether the oral tradition will be as alive, for generations to come, in the digital age.