preview of ´une soiree pleine d´histoires (an evening of stories) 2017 – the stories & their tellers !!

Alliance francaise du Bengale, Iris Home Fragrances & Culture Monks welcomes you to the 2nd Edition of ¨Une Soiree Pleine d´Histoires (An Evening of Stories) 2017¨ !!

Hey !!

Aren’t we glad to invite you to Une Soiree Pleine d´Histoires (An Evening of Stories).

Its but an ordinary evening, like evenings are, as the sun sulks away and the world slips into darkness and the the home becomes, once more a nest. The world is little more unfettered, bathed in myriad strings of lights. Cafes lit up with laughter, bars drowned in a cacophony, lovers meet, children run down alleys, shops bustles with desire, the beggar lays down his plate, the singer tests the microphone, the drummer his pedals, the stray dog wanders…

The soul is a wanderer for stories though, and this evening, an ordinary evening is but ‘An Evening of Stories’ – stories from hidden places and times which have eluded us or which beckons. Stories – myriad, eclectic, cooked up, lived & shared, for us.

For each evening is special & every life is an amazing story !!

This yearś ¨An Evening of Stories’ will be held on September 13, 2017 . The venue is the Alliance francaise du Bengale, Park Street, Kolkata.

The 2017 edition of An Evening of Stories features a wide range of stories, all of them from women storytellers, touching on issues of existentialism, desire, parenthood, class struggle & relationships.

The schedule is as follows :

05:00 PM : Welcome Note

05:15 PM : Dreams & Desire by Puja Dam

05:30 PM : Sakura Haiku by Swati Sharma

06:00 PM : Dreams by Dolan Chatterjee

06:15 PM : Sylvie/la magie des paillettes/dame zinimo by Roseline

06:35 PM : The Journey by Arpita Nag

06:55 PM : ‘Tota-Kahini’ retold by Priyanka Chatterjee

07:15 PM : Any Three Days of a Homemaker by Madhu Shrivastav

07:45 PM : An Exorcism and A Disappearance & Querita by Inam Hussain Mullick

08:10 PM : Golpo by Deebleena Tripathi

08:40 PM : Gall-Gourmet by Sudeshna

09:10 PM : If we meet again, we shall smile by Anushua Chakrabarti

09:35 PM : ATM-1023 Park Street by D Kautilya AV, Dolan Chatterjee, Shubhi Malik, Aakash Patra, Muktadeep Saha, and Ankit Kumar

09:50 PM : Closing & Refreshments

The Details are as follows :

Story Name : Sylvie/la magie des paillettes/dame zinimo

Storyteller/s : Roseline

Duration : 15 mins

Language : French

Synopsis : Dame Zinimo is a story of an African witch, that is derivated from peul mythology. Sylvie is inspired by a true story of an handicapped woman who has refused abortion.

La magie des paillettes explains the insemation of cows through the eyes of a little girl.
These three stories deal with children experiences, good or bad, and seen through children’s eyes.

Story Name : Gall-Gourmet

Storyteller/s : Sudeshna Bagchi

Duration : 25 mins

Language : English, Bengali, Hindi

Synopsis : Laxmi, an ‘ordinary’ girl , was always told that her only purpose in life was to get married someday, to bear children and to raise them, and to serve her family at all cost. Her only ace up her sleeve-her culinary brilliance, by means she could turn a simple curry into nothing short of a gourmet. So, when she is faced with an abusive husband and an equally, if not more, abusive mother-in-law, who curse her ‘low birth’ and heap insults upon her, she decides to give her tormentors a ‘taste’ of their own medicine, doing what she does best-cooking. A story of an ‘ordinary’ woman’s struggle to free herself from a bad marriage, with a gastronomical twist, it promises entertainment while it lasts and much beyond.

Story Name : Golpo

Storyteller/s : Debleena Tripathi

Duration : 25 mins

Language : English, Bengali, Hindi

Synopsis : The narrator begins by saying that the story to be narrated has been narrated time and again by people all over the world. It is a story that many of the audience members could be familiar with. But now, the story belongs to her, the narrator, since she has chosen to retell it and to all the people listening to her story, because they have chosen to listen. With all these new lives to share, the story rejuvenates itself! She goes on to narrate the story like an Indian folk-lore, adapting both from Shakespeare’s “Othello” and Cinthio’s “Disdemona and the Moor”. The narrator asks questions to the audience, offers prizes for correct answers and requests audience members to provide background music/sounds to her story (there could be a few performers in the audience to initiate participation). The audience are, after a while, led to expect that the story would go along like its predecessors (“Othello”, etc.) The twist comes when the audience are asked to decide what could happen in the end of this story. Would Kanu (the character corresponding to Othello) not understand that Archisman (character corresponding to Iago) is trying to turn him against Deyasini (built on Desdemona)? Would he really resort to extreme violence? And would Deyasini not be able to gauge the situation and warn Kanu accordingly? The audience are given an option. A discussion might ensue. Till date, all the audience have voted in favour of a happy ending. It could be reiterated that we have a say in stories around us – and happy endings are for us to choose. As is understandable, the performance is flexible and morphs itself according to audience response.

Story Name : Any Three Days of a Homemaker.

Storyteller/s : Madhu Sriwastav

Duration : 25 mins

Language : English, Bengali

Synopsis : Its the tale of a married woman who is confined to her home- the term home itself …remains an enigma for her…as its implications of comfort ,solidarity , harmony are conspicuous by there absence..its a search for her self…adjusting to people and circumstances ..when one day she realizes that she has …grown old…and rusty..and cannot go back in time!

Story Name : Sakura Haiku

Storyteller/s : Swati Sharma

Duration : 20 mins

Language : English, Hindi

Synopsis : A first-time mother’s quest to discover herself and the joys of motherhood through this solo-trip to the land of cherry blossoms with her 5-month-old daughter.

Story Name : Dream and desire

Storyteller/s : Puja Dam

Duration : 10 mins

Language : Bengali

Synopsis : A dream and a desire between boyfriend and a girlfriend

Story Name : Dreams

Storyteller/s : Dolan Chatterjee

Duration : 10 mins

Language :Bengali

Synopsis : Everyone has dreams but all of them can’t reach to that goal.

Story Name : ATM-1023 Park Street

Storyteller/s : D Kautilya AV, Dolan Chatterjee, Shubhi Malik, Aakash Patra, Muktadeep Saha, and Ankit Kumar

Written by: -Kautilya AV

Duration : 15 mins

Language : English, Bengali, Hindi

Synopsis : An ATM is not just a machine but it is a venue of stories. Stories of different people who visit the ATM every day. Some who follow rules, some who don’t; some who lie or some who don’t; some steal and some don’t. ATM has lots to share. So is this ATM who wants to share some stories that it has experienced.

Story Name : The Journey

Storyteller/s : Arpita Nag

Duration : 15 mins

Language : English/Bengali

Synopsis : As the protagonist oscillates between reality and fantasy, a journey that begins in the hustle and bustle of the city ends in an introspective sojourn.

Story Name : ‘Tota-Kahini’ retold

Storyteller/s : Priyanka Chatterjee

Duration : 15 mins

Language : Bengali/English

Synopsis : ‘Tota-Kahini’, the masterpiece by Rabindranath Tagore, is retold from a Case Study angle.

Story Name : An Exorcism and A Disappearance & Querita

Storyteller/s : Inam Hussain Mullick

Duration : 20 minutes

Language : English

Synopsis : An Exorcism and A Disappearance -Bessie Hope and Sunetryo investigate supernatural disturbances.

Querita – A story about Querita, a reader of Tarot cards and her young querent Odea, as time goes by.

Story Name : Stories from her recent book If we meet again, we shall smile