Chris Joliffe

Poet & Story-teller

Contribution to the Show

Chris has an amazing talent for capturing emotion in his words, and we felt there was no better debut for this amazing bard than for you to hear his poem Forget Me Not as well as his Samhain Story on our Samhain Holiday Special for 2011, SP26.

Biography

There's nothing like being self-styled to mess up definitions. I was born just over forty years ago in the south-east of London and still live here, halfway between concrete and trees on the edge of the urban sprawl. From Bristol to Durham and Nottingham, my parents and grandparents have lived in rows of houses in mazes of streets. Perhaps this is why I write stories the way I do, trying to look past the bricks to find the land beneath.

If anything is to be told of myself, perhaps my the best illustration would be my home.
I live in a modern flat, one of several on a small estate. My skylines are forests, my front door leads onto a traffic-clogged A-road. My walls are lined with pictures of wolves I have adopted, and after decades of medieval reenactment  with shields and weapons. My bookshelves are a smorsgabord of everything and nothing, but an old glass-fronted bookcase in the hall holds old stories, histories and the deep thoughts of many. In one room stands a much-loved lap harp, with which I make pleasant sounds to a greater or lesser degree. Unpublished as I am, my tales and poems are kept on the hard drive of my computer or in my head, from where they occasionally spill forth when I storytell.

I can lay no claim to pagan titles of pedigree; I follow a personal path with tinges of shamanism and bardic leanings, rather heavily marked with the pugmarks  of wolves and ravens. What I do best comes through me, not from me. As for the virtue of my beliefs, I let the words given to me speak for themselves.

Chris Jolliffe

© All non-original items about Chris Joliffe on this page are copyright Chris Joliffe 2011

 Last Updated: April 19, 2012