Whenever I see a piece titled “The Moth” I assume that it must be related in some way to the writings of Virginia Woolf, Annie Dillard, or countless others who have written elegies to the short-lived winged insect. But the article I picked up in Sunday’s New York Times had nothing to do with death by candlelight. It was instead about a very spirited Moth that seems to be morphing all around the country.
The Moth, a nonprofit group who sponsors storytelling events in New York and Los Angeles, was formed by poet and novelist George Dawes Green. His move to New York took him far from the gossamer arthropods that lingered to hear stories on his Southern family’s porch. He missed them — the stories, that is — and the community that ensued. And so, he began to invite others to his city apartment to hear and tell stories. Three or four people became thirty or forty and before long he was looking for additional room to host his new community of friends.
One of the photos that accompanied the newspaper article showed people lined up around the block, anxious to hear and tell stories. The article was largely about how a forum for the everyday man and woman had grown into a place where professionals are now regulars, hoping to be noticed by agents who frequent the halls. But it is the initial idea that inspired my response to the article. I would love to reproduce that storytelling community here in Charlottesville. And WriterHouse seems a likely place to try it out because that’s what we are — storytellers!
After visiting Moth’s website, I learned that Moth encourages spin-offs, even helps others get something off the ground. They call it “MothUP – The Living Room Satellite Moth.” Storytelling evenings would complement the already popular WriterHouse-sponsored readers’ evenings. They just might attract a new audience of writers into our fold, those who like to perform their stories, in the style of Garrison Keillor or Ira Glass. If anyone else has any interest in this, I invite you to visit the website at www.themoth.org and let me know what you think.