author
Marie L. Shedlock
1854–1935
An early champion of modern storytelling, she helped turn spoken tales into a serious art for teachers and librarians. Her best-known book, The Art of the Story-Teller, grew out of years spent showing how stories could spark imagination without feeling like lessons.
2 Audiobooks
The Art of Story-Telling
by Marie L. Shedlock
The Art of the Story-Teller
by Marie L. Shedlock
About the author
Born in 1854, Marie Louise Shedlock became known as an influential storyteller, teacher, and writer at a time when oral storytelling was gaining new attention in schools and libraries. She is most closely associated with The Art of the Story-Teller, the book that preserved her ideas about how stories should be told aloud with clarity, feeling, and restraint.
Shedlock believed that a story should be offered as a living experience rather than explained too heavily. That approach made her especially important to educators and children's librarians, and her work helped shape the way storytelling was practiced in the English-speaking world in the early 20th century.
She died in 1935, but her writing still appeals to readers interested in performance, education, and the history of children's literature. Her work feels practical as well as thoughtful, which is one reason it has continued to be read long after its first publication.