MR. KOJO NNAMDIFrom WAMU 88.5 at American University in Washington, welcome to "The Kojo Nnamdi Show," connecting your neighborhood with the world. His name is unusual and so is his craft. Odds Bodkin is a professional storyteller. Some of his stories last less than a minute, others can last hours and take you through an entire piece of classical literature. He adds dramatic sound and music with instruments like a Celtic harp and the 12-string guitar. His particular talent is for creating vivid images and characters and he voices all of the different parts himself.

MR. KOJO NNAMDIHe can keep 12-year-olds glued to their seats for an imaginable length of time and his magic isn't lost on older audiences either. They all get caught up in his retelling of Greek myths and African folk tales. His goal has always been to entertain. But behind the fun of listening to these stories, there's learning going on and he's using age-old lessons to help kids navigate the sometimes tough passages to adulthood. He joins us in the studio. Odds Bodkin is an award-winning storyteller and children's author. So good to see you again.

MR. ODDS BODKINSo good to see you again.

NNAMDIStorytelling seems to be very popular these days. There's NPR's "This American Life" and the National Project called StoryCorps in which I participated and The Moth where people have five minutes to tell a personal story to an audience. What do you think is causing this renaissance of the story?

BODKINOh, well, I think it begins with the overabundance of the image and then I think add to that the fact that there were so many of us now with so little control over what is going on around us that it is one of the ways to mine your way down into a personal state about being here.

NNAMDIWell, you've stuck with what you've been doing very successfully for years. You describe it as, in these days, like a pebble in a stream. Why is that?

BODKINWell, the stream I was referring to was the great on-rush of personal storytelling, whereas what I do, I am sitting very still as all those wondrous new stories rush by trying to preserve some of these very old and dear ones.

NNAMDIBut, you know, what I hear more and more these days are personal stories. And in these personal stories, the people, those of us who hear these stories, are expected to find something universal in these stories. You do the opposite, in a way. You tell universal stories in which the listener finds something personal.

BODKINI do indeed attempt to do that.

NNAMDIYou succeed.

BODKINSome of the stories, Kojo, that I tell have been around for many thousands of years so they have stood in the stream and been wobbled back and forth for quite some time. And yet they are still extant, people still love to hear them and take a fairly deep nourishment from them. So, in my situation, personally, nothing has ever happened to me of any warrant or merit. And so what I do is I find stories where something substantial has already happened.

NNAMDIOh, a lot of things have happened to him of warrant and merit. I met one of them just before the show, but that's another story. If you'd like to speak with Odds Bodkin, you can call at 800-433-8850 or ask a question, make a comment at our website, kojoshow.org. How did you become a professional storyteller?

BODKINI began as a professional environmental educator working in Manhattan, taking children on field walks in the north end of Central Park. And I discovered, after showing them all manner of photomicrographs and the interiors of leaves and spiral galaxies and all sorts of things trying to link those images to what they saw in the woods, that when I told them a Native American myth, something happened in their eyes. There was a sort of attention level that expanded that I had never seen before, nor had their teachers. And I said to myself, a-ha, something is engaged here, something ancient and very powerful and beautiful. And it was that storytelling spell.

NNAMDIThat a-ha moment that led to a professional career, a professional career that apparently, in a way, started out with hanging a shingle in New Hampshire and people wondering what the heck does he do for a living?

BODKINWe were the first professional storytellers to arrive in New Hampshire. And I'll never forget a principal when my wife Nel (ph) contacted him and said, oh, you sent the ditto about the storyteller. What on earth does a storyteller do? Please, tell me. And it wasn't long, though, before people around my state began to realize that, yeah, kids will listen, for some reason, and it's much like a literature experience.

NNAMDIAnd now, you've been doing it for 28 years.

BODKINIndeed.

NNAMDIAnd still enjoying it. You've got an unusual name, which is appropriate for an unusual job description. Where does your name come from?

BODKINI grew up in Alexandria, Va.

NNAMDIRight next door, down the street.

BODKINRight next door, absolutely. And my name was John Bodkin. And growing up with a name like that, what you quickly discover is that people laugh and say, oh, Odds Bodkin, yes.

BODKINBecause they've heard the Old English epithet for years and years and they make fun of it. So when I decided to professionalize this entire madness, I co-opted the name and said, well, if a storytelling name, goodness, Odds Bodkin may well work. And nowadays, children come up to me and ask me if I know that my name is in "Harry Potter." And I smile and say, well, an ancient word is in "Harry Potter."

NNAMDIAnd that ancient word, Odds Bodkin, means?

BODKINWell, it means God's little body or God's bones. Then it's a polite way of swearing in Elizabethan days. And that's its essential derivation. But it became more just a piece of common parlance when people were very frustrated.

NNAMDIOf course, when it refers to Odds Bodkin, we think of something else entirely. So tell us a story.

BODKINI would love to tell you a story. I know that I'm in the Washington area in an area where power politics plays dominant constantly and there's very little one can do to escape it than following the national news just like everybody else. So, I thought I would toss in a piece of absolutely, impossibly delightful material that comes from ancient Greece, actually from ancient Athens.

BODKINAesop was a Phrygian slave who, because of the wherewithal at work inside his small stories about animals usually, was given his freedom by the Athenians, a statue was raised to him. And this is a story of his. It's called "The Wind and the Sun." It's one that I tell to young children all the time. It has to do with after I've asked them, how many of you have never ever in your entire life ever had an argument with anyone?

NNAMDIMe, me.

BODKINA very few hands go up even when they're kindergarteners, believe me. "The Wind and the Sun." Here we go.

BODKIN(makes noise) High in the sky one day, the mighty wind looked over at the sun and the wind said, I'm stronger than you are. The sun looked back and said, well, I'm not sure about that. Well, then I'll prove it, said the might wind. And the wind looked down onto the earth and there walking along a country road dressed in a heavy winter coat was a traveling man. Do you see the traveler down there? said the wind. Whichever one of us can make him take off that coat first, he will be the stronger of the two of us. Do you agree? The sun agreed to the strange contest. And so the wind took a deep cold breath and (makes noise) blew a blast of cold icy wind down onto the man and his coat. The leaves flew past and the wind spun him and was cold. But he wrapped his arms around himself and did up his top button, trying to fend off that cold, cool wind. But he would not remove his coat.

BODKINThen it came the sun's turn to try. The sun thought a moment and then decided simply to shine. Warm gentle light down on the man in his coat. But it wasn't long before the man realized that the day about him had grown beautiful and warm and that he really no longer needed to wear a coat at all. And so, of his own free will, he took it off. He threw it over his shoulder and happily walked on. And so the sun won the contest of strength. And since Aesop's fables always come with a moral, the moral is a little bit of kindness will often do more to solve a problem between people than all the bluster and all the force one possesses.

NNAMDILadies and gentlemen, Odds Bodkin, award-winning storyteller and children's author. We're going to take a short break. When we come back, we will continue our conversation with Odds Bodkin and take your calls. So if you have questions or comments for him at 800-433-8850. You can also send e-mail to kojo@wamu.org. You can send us a tweet @kojoshow. You notice how my voice tends to slow down when he starts playing? Or you can go to our website, kojoshow.org and join the conversation there. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.

NNAMDIOur guest is Odds Bodkin. He is an award-winning storyteller and children's author. We're taking your calls at 800-433-8850. You can send an e-mail to kojo@wamu.org. One of your best known performances is your telling of the Greek epic poem, "The Odyssey." It's a rare skill to be able to tell a tale that runs to hundreds of pages. How do you keep a story like that in your head?

BODKINActually, I have to admit that I don't, in that I don't really recite Homer's work. It is a four-hour adaptation and a re-imagination of Homer's epic telling. And what I've done is much as he did in the ancient world. Other than with a lyre, now with a 12-string guitar. But as scholars suggest, with character voices, as he may well have done. I present the story in modern language for middle schoolers, high schoolers. I just performed it at Harvard as part of their epic series at their museum...

NNAMDII read about that.

BODKIN...just a couple of weeks ago. For young audiences, who can capture the essence of the adventure of that narrative through a telling like this and truly imagine it vividly without being somewhat lost, as many young modern readers are, in the complexities of the Homeric language.

NNAMDIOf course, it's interesting because Homer's original was in the oral tradition before being committed to paper.

BODKINIt was. Scribes sat down this blind geniuses work, people think, and from there, it really solidified. Whereas when Homer was in performance, I understand that he would launch in what were called poetic cadenzas. Part of the rhyme scheme was an mnemonic device, enabling the poet to remember the next word by its rhyme suggestion hanging from the last. And so it was part memory device and part art. The rhyme scheme. But occasionally, if he were inspired, he would leave behind his memorized text and launched off into a cadenza, much like a violinist in a concerto will have a few minutes to just go wild and then return to the text. And so it's thought that Homer did that very same sort of thing.

NNAMDIDo you do that?

BODKINI do that all the time. I cannot tell the story the same way twice.

NNAMDIDo you ever -- well, do you ever simply memorize stories from the text at all?

BODKINNever.

NNAMDIHere is Loyce in Silver Spring, Md. Loyce, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

LOYCEHi, I am a elementary school librarian and, of course, that involves lots of storytelling. My name rhymes with magic and I tell my students I have magic because I have stories. Stories have such magic to them and it's no surprise to me that while you were working with children in the way you earlier described that they cottoned right to the stories. Stories are like door openers. I just love them and I thought I'd tell you a little one. And that's, "How Grandpa Lost his Dentures."

LOYCEYou see, he was making his last trip to the WC that day on his way to bed and as he was flushing, a great yawn came upon him. And at the very last gurgle of no return, there went the dentures. I mean, every little bit of life has stories.

NNAMDIThank you very much for your thoughts, Loyce. Except there's one little thing that I observed here. Loyce doesn't rhyme with magic.

LOYCESay again, please?

NNAMDILoyce doesn't rhyme with magic.

LOYCEOh, no. Should I tell you my last name?

NNAMDIYes.

LOYCEVagic.

NNAMDIThank you.

BODKINThank you.

NNAMDINow, the words -- now the world is a much more understandable place. Thank you very...

LOYCEOdd Bodkin, thank you for your gift of stories.

BODKINOh, well, thank you for your comment about it. And thanks for the story. I’m still seeing the dentures...

LOYCEThank you.

BODKIN...tumbling down toward the drain.

LOYCEOh, yes, at the last gurgle of no return.

NNAMDIThank you very much for your call, Loyce. We move onto Chris is Derwood, Md. Chris, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

CHRISYes, hello, thanks for taking my call. It just occurred to me, hearing this little short story, that those with the gift of voices can, in their stories, bring great peace. And I just wondered if possibly Odds had done any stories, for example, children with cancer or old people who were bedridden? I think it would be something that could bring great benefit to them. And I also wanted to know if he had any CDs because I would like to perhaps buy a CD with stories. And finally, the two of you might consider doing voices for a story because Kojo has a very interesting voice as well. And if you wanted to go back and forth in a dialogue, it could be very interesting.

NNAMDIWell, you should know that we are recording this even as we speak and we'll be putting out a CD on it immediately after the show. But frankly, that's what we do for every show so I don't think that will become a recording sensation. But I do know that Odds does do storytelling for the disabled including people who are visually impaired.

BODKINThe last time I had the privilege of telling stories to children who were bedridden was at the Mayo Clinic about two winters ago. These were children who had been through a set of terrors that I can only imagine, being a healthy man. I can only imagine it. And so I went and performed for them in their foyer and then went from room to room and spoke with them.

NNAMDI800-433-8850, the other question that Chris had was whether or not he can find your recorded material anyplace?

BODKINOh, sure. The best place to go is www.oddsbodkin.net and if you go there and just type it into URL window, if I can say that three times and not fall over, I'll be lucky. And there you'll be at my website. There are downloads of 17 audios ranging from the Odyssey and epic telling stories for middle schoolers, stories for very young children. And they're easily purchased there, as well as some CDs you'll also find. So that's the place to go.

NNAMDIAnd Chris you'll find a link at our website, kojoshow.org, to OddsBodkin.net so you can, from our website, go directly to his. And thank you for your call. Onto Kalid in Fairfax, Va. Kalid, your turn.

KALIDYes, hi. I'm originally from Damascus, Syria. I just wanted to let you know, a long time ago, this is before the TV there were story teller who work this as a job. And I just want to tell you they used to read this story for adults and all the adults gather in a café. And of course, they don't finish the story in one day, they keep on coming back for more. And just wanted to let you know they used to, sometimes they go out of this, what they're reading, the script and because people get excited. I want to ask you the same question, if you ever did that, like went out and changed the -- whatever you're reading?

BODKINWell, firstly, I don't read. I work from a kind of mental imagery where I see pictures in my mind and as I go, I choose the words as I go. However, to answer your question, in those imagines that I'm imagining, new things constantly upwell and present themselves. Even stories I've returned to many, many, many times. So there's a bit of both at work. I stick to the story that's held in my mental images and my memory, but when I encounter something new, off I go.

NNAMDIThank you very much your call, Kalid. We're talking with Odds Bodkin. He is an award winning storyteller and children's author. Taking your calls at 800-433-8850. Do you think story telling is making a comeback? Well, did it ever leave? Do you think in an age of video games and television, kids can connect good old fashioned story telling? They certainly seem to connect with Odds Bodkin. But we're interested in hearing from you so call us at 800-433-8850 or you can just send us a tweet at kojoshow. What's important to you when you're interpreting a story?

BODKINThe audience, principally. I perform for the very youngest of children, all the way through university0age people. If I'm performing the Iliad book one for 800 college freshman, my job is to deliver to them something that will hold their attention unwaveringly, using voices and music and sounds, and will allow them to see a complete vivid image of the great argument between Achilles and Agamemnon. And that is my job, it takes an hour. If, however, as I was doing just yesterday before driving down here, performing for 1st through 3rd graders and they wanted a series of Native American stories.

BODKINI have to engage them with rhythm, with call and response, teach them songs and then have them participate because they're little ones. The little ones have to participate otherwise they become antsy and they become disengaged. And so it really depends upon who is hearing the story, what it is that I'm trying to do.

NNAMDIYour performances have been compared to Troop Theater. Have -- how did you learn to master so many different voices? Was it one of the imperatives of the profession?

BODKINIt really wasn't. I'm a bit of an out liar in this profession in that I -- part of the art that I attempt to practice is to use as many distinct voices as possible as a character actor and then add music to those voices. That's just my style. And it's a bit of a pontoon out there, I have to admit, but I really know no other way to do it.

NNAMDIYou incorporate stories from all cultures, Danish fairytales, African folk legends. China's been in the news a lot here in the U.S. these days. We see ourselves increasingly in competition with China as a world power. So I guess our audience might be interested in hearing a story that originates from China.

BODKINI'd be delighted.

NNAMDIThank you.

BODKINWe are in competition with the Chinese for good reason.

NNAMDIYes, indeed. Ladies and gentleman, Odds Bodkin.

BODKINAnd old Chinese story called, "The Runaway Horse." (plays guitar) Once at the edge of a small village, there lived an old man and his son. Of all the people in the village, these two were the most poor and the only possession the young man could call his own was his horse. Strong young mare. Every morning, he would leap up upon her back and gallop out across the misty fields, feel the wind in his face. Hear the thunder of her hoofs beneath him. And it was the only freedom he ever really knew. But never, ever would he ride his mare into the forest.

BODKINFor the forest was not deep and beyond it stretched the plains and riding upon the plains were the Nomads. Fierce warrior people who long ago had attacked the farmers of the village, but no one could really remember it. It was more like a story on the old men's lips. Well, one day, the young man was seated in front of his hut and there placidly tethered to a post by a leather thong stood his mare when, suddenly, she reared up, snapped her thong and thundered out across the fields. He jumped up and called, come back, come back, please, come back. But she seemed not to hear him. She galloped into the forest and disappeared.

BODKINAnd when the neighbors saw that his one possession in the world had run off, they all came crowding into the hut and said, oh, what great misfortune. Look, you lost your horse, now you're twice as poor. And they all slapped one another on the backs and they left. But his old father, seeing his son, asked, how do you know this is not a blessing? How do you know? Well, the young man thought, losing my horse, a blessing, how can that be? And yet it wasn't a week later he was lying in his bed and he heard the sound of hoofs.

BODKINHe pushed himself up on his elbow and looked out his window and there thundering back across the misty fields came his mare and behind her followed a war horse, a stallion. Why, she had gone through the herds of the Nomads beyond the forest and she'd cut loose a mate. And when the neighbors saw that there were now two horses tethered to the post instead of none at all, they came crowding into the hut and said, well, what great good fortune. Look, twice as many as one. Very soon, you'll be horse dealer. And they all pushed one another out the door.

BODKINBut his old father looked at his son and asked, how do you know this is not disaster? How do you know? The young man thought, losing my horse and now having a mating pair, disaster, how can that be? And yet, yet, it wasn't but a week later he riding, but he was not riding his mare who knew him. For the first time he'd be foolish enough to climb up onto the back of the war horse. And the giant steed did not know what to do with this light load that did not know how to ride.

BODKINAnd so into the forest, suddenly, he was flying. Leaves and limbs whipping past his face, all he could do was wrap his fingers into the horse's mane. And then, suddenly, the horse reared up and threw him to the ground. And in the fall, he broke his hip. And as he lay in pain for many hours, he wondered what he would do until the neighbors, afraid at even being in the forbidden forest, found him and carried him home. And as they put him in his bed, they said, what great misfortune. Look, you broke your hip. You'll never be the same, good-bye. And they all left. But his old father seeing the pain, not only in his son's body, but in his eyes, looked and asked, how do you know this is not a blessing?

BODKINHow do you know?" And the young man's hip indeed was broken and it would not nit well. He lay for weeks and could not rise. He could hear the sounds of the children playing outside his window. When one day, he heard the gongs banging in the village corners. That was the sound of danger. He pushed himself up on his elbow, looked out the window, young people with staves and pitch forks were running by. It seemed that the Nomads were attacking. Galloping across the misty meadows, they thundered in the village and a terrible battle was fought.

BODKINAnd in it, nine out of 10 villagers who fought to defend their lives lost them. But the young man who could not rise to fight, through no fault of his own, survived to live a long life, albeit with a limp. And so the old ones in China will say that just beneath blessing crouches disaster. But always perched above disaster like the nightingale, one finds blessing. And it is difficult to know which is really which. How do you know?

NNAMDIOdds Bodkin, ladies and gentleman with a story from China. You find your audiences relate to these stories from different cultures. And on occasion, they're surprised that these stories actually come from other cultures, are they not?

BODKINWell, when they hear that story, that story means a lot to me.

NNAMDIIt means a lot to me, too.

BODKIN(unintelligible) that's happened to me quite a few times. And so when people hear a story like that and then they hear that it's from China, well, then there's a degree of, what I feel at least, admiration at work in the human heart upon hearing such a tale and knowing its origin and thereby an admiration for the people who created it.

NNAMDIBecause we all have hip replacement surgery in our future, do we not? Here is Mike...

BODKINDon't tell me that.

NNAMDI...here is Mike in Fairfax, Va. Mike, you are on the air. Go ahead, please.

MIKEOh, good afternoon, gentlemen. I just wanted to comment that as a father I've noticed the great power of stories. Not only for conveying morals, but conveying new ways of thinking in the benefit of experience that you've never had. And I wanted to add, as somebody who reads a lot of history, I've noticed in great books like "The Assenities (sp?)," there are always threads that, in and of themselves, just small parts of the big book, that are wonderful stories. And I wanted to get the -- your guest's comment on the use of actual historical events and real history as stories.

BODKINThe historical novel is by far one of the most effective and highly evolved ways to bring history to life. I tell a lot of stories, Mike, that are infused with ancient events. And by far, the best history teachers in the world stand before their students and they just hold forth. And just as you mentioned, they link events, thread to thread to thread, across a kind of hatchwork of events so that history, instead of that raw list of disconnected facts, becomes what it truly is, the story of people on the earth. So I concur completely with what you say.

NNAMDIThank you for your call, Mike. Here is Mr. C in Southeast Washington. Mr. C, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

MR. COkay, how you doing today?

NNAMDII'm doing well.

BODKINDoing well.

CI've developed a character called, Mr. C. I work with the youth here in Potomac Gardens and they didn't want to say sir or yes, sir so I just changed my name from Carlton to Mr. C. But I want to issue him a challenge and one question. The challenge is, do he think he can write a story about four young men who were killed in Potomac Gardens? Each one has a little before their name, Little Stan, Little Rock, Little John John and on the last one was N. John. And he was the only one that wasn't murdered. He swallowed a little toy whistle and died on the playground.

CBut each one of these little kids are famous in this neighborhood and I was wondering -- and his hands won't be tied. He can -- it can be non-religious, make a fantasy or whatever. But these kids are popular in this neighborhood. They wrote their names everywhere. And the advice is, how would I -- I'm doing my own character, Mr. C., and the gardens is in the G.

NNAMDISo you're looking for professional help is what you're looking for...

CYes, sir.

NNAMDI...Mr. C.? Exactly what kind...

CYeah.

NNAMDI...of work are you doing with these young people in Potomac Gardens?

CI'm taking the -- I'm working with the kids that everybody says that are, uh, beyond help. You know, they're the ones who play hooky from school and they still get good grades. I don't know how they doing it. I stopped paying them because they -- one kid, he made the honor roll without trying. All he did was show up. This year, he's not going to school, but he's still making A's. I don't understand how he's doing it. He must be a genius.

NNAMDIWell, clearly this is challenge for you. Odds Bodkin, is there any advice you can give to our caller, Mr. C., about creating stories out of events that occur in the real world today that seem fairly tragic?

BODKINIt sounds to me like Carlton is three-fourths of the way toward creating the story himself. No one will know the Gardens better than you, Carlton. No one will know the four young men that you're discussing in your story better than you. Therefore, I would humbly suggest to you that the story had already chosen you and I will have very little say or influence, other than if you want to e-mail me and ask for my help once you have created the beginning and the middle and the end of what you think would make a compelling narrative of these lives. To suggest, I think that the story is yours, sir.

NNAMDIWe're going to take a short break, Carlton, and I will advise you to keep listening because when we come back, I'm going to ask Odds Bodkin a question about how he does what he does and that may be able to help you. Of course, others can call 800-433-8850 if you'd like to join the conversation. Has a story ever moved you or even transformed your life? 800-433-8850 or go to our website, kojoshow.org, join the conversation there. Thank you for your call, Mr. C. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.

NNAMDIWelcome back to our conversation with Odds Bodkin. He is an award-winning storyteller and children's author. When you tell a story, you focus on images and you tell audiences to expect a mind movie. What is that?

BODKINThat is a full five imaginations experience. Think of it. You can imagine smells, you can imagine tastes, you can imagines sounds, you can imagine feelings in your bodies and you can imagine the sights that work in your eyes. If people, when they listen to stories, are willing to be entertained to that level, then it's as if the storyteller really isn't there to be watched so much as to suggest a series of images to the listener. And once the listener takes them, a movie appears in the mind.

NNAMDIFascinating. Back to the telephones. Here is Rachel in Fairfax, Va. Rachel, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

RACHELThank you so much. First, let me say, I love your show and this show is such a treat. I'm a parent and an educator and I have a comment and a question. The first is, I think all parents are storytellers to an extent and my daughter's favorite stories are stories of her childhood. So I'm constantly retelling her stories of when she was two or three or four. My question is, I love reading books out loud and I do it to my students and I do it to my daughter and have for years. How do you go from reading out loud to being a storyteller?

BODKINFind a story, Rachel, that you absolutely adore and that you've read many times and that you know well. Firstly, I'd like to say that any parent who tells or reads or in any way interacts with her children or his children is the best of all parents. And it will come back to you as creativity and happiness much later in the children's lives. But anyway, back to the -- back to how to become a storyteller. Rachel, when you read, um, do you often imagine the story itself?

RACHELOh, very much.

BODKINIf you were seated in a room -- I assume you're in a room. Look around you and just tell me a couple of the things that you see.

RACHELI have book jackets all over the walls so book jackets is what I'm looking at right now.

BODKINSo once upon a time, Rachel sat in a room of book jackets. It was as if she were in a beehive of book jackets and each one of them was a life as the -- like the tiny cells inside a bee's nest. You could begin that way. And from there, uh, imaginatively, it's the very same thing. You look at an imaginative image and you will name what you see within your mind's eye. That is all that storytelling is.

NNAMDIRachel, not only thank you for your call, but if you don't succeed in doing this, it's my understanding that you can even get an iPhone app called Tales 2 Go.

BODKINYes, you can.

NNAMDITell us about that.

BODKINTales 2 Go, T-A-L-E-S with a 2 in between, and a G-O. It is a new iPhone app for moms and dads on the go, but mostly moms on the go, who would prefer to let their children, through their iPods in the car or at home, listen to spoken word stories by the finest storytellers and audio creators in America rather than drop down that little TV screen and have them watching something else.

BODKINThe more your children listen and imagine, the stronger their minds become. It's just a basic fact. And Tales 2 Go is a wonderful new app that has thousands of stories. All of mine are there, those of other storytellers from across America are there. So just search through the 300,000 some odd apps that are out there and there it is. It's a little gem sitting there.

NNAMDIAnd of course remember to share it with your kids because a lot of people like me will want them for ourselves more than anybody else. Your goal is not just -- and thank you very much for your call, Rachel, and good luck to you. Odds, your goal is not just to entertain, but also to educate. You're working on a version of the classic Roman tale of Hercules in order to teach kids about bullying. How do you make a story that thousands of years old relate to kids and bullying today?

BODKINIt's called "Young Hercules: The Legendary Bully." And when the Art Institute of Chicago, years ago, commissioned me to do the myth of Hercules, I quickly learned that the true Hercules of myth was a sociopath. As a teenager, he grew frustrated and killed his music teacher, Linus, with a lyre, banging him over the head. He was banished from his princedom and wandered through the woods.

BODKINAnd then, later, he was married, had children, and in a rage, murdered his entire family. He killed many, many people. He was a sociopath. He was a legendary bully. It was the 12 labors that most people have some vague recollection of that constituted his atonement before the Fates and Zeus.

BODKINThe version that I created is 100 minutes long, and it's a confession of Hercules telling his entire story like this with a musical score and lots of other characters, including Eurystheus, his cousin, and all manner of other characters. But the arc of the tale describes, and it works very well for -- I've performed this for men in prison and gotten standing ovations from men in prison for this particular story, "The Rage of Hercules."

BODKINThe arc of his development is that he begins to learn empathy. He begins to unravel the fury that is within him. And the program that I've developed, it's a complete online teaching program with 135 question cards, some interpretive, some content, with a workbook and a script and all manner of things. And it'll go online at my site on the 1st of January in 2011. That's all free.

BODKINAll you have to do is pay $14 or something for the audio, if you want to use it, but you need not because the full script is there. And it's designed to urge middle schoolers, high schoolers and college kids using this -- I'm trying to find a polite way to say this over the air -- a powerful story that pulls very few punches, as a way to engage them in discussions, peer discussions.

NNAMDIBecause when you say to middle and high school kids, it's not nice to hurt other people's feelings, they don't seem to respond to that.

BODKINThey don't care. Particularly if someone of your vintage or mine stands in front of them and says so. That's why I'm convinced that this new approach, which is a mythological approach -- Hercules is so far removed into the past, he's a Greek god or some demigod at least. He never really even existed in any of the forms we've seen. He's a representative of an ancient pagan religion no one believes in anymore, and yet his human story is tough stuff and it's the example material.

NNAMDIAs you point out, it's part of an online curriculum. That's kind of a new direction for you, is it not?

BODKINIt is. I've been working on it for many, many weeks and it will be ready in another month or so.

NNAMDIBack to the phones. Here is Karla in Columbia, Md. Karla, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

KARLAI'm so happy to be able to talk to you, Kojo and Odds. I have three children. My boys are twin boys who are now 16 and a daughter, 18. We used to call them seek and destroy and our little diva. They were a little rowdy.

BODKINSounds that way.

KARLAI'll never forget the first time I introduced them to Odds Bodkin's work. We were on road trips, and we never went on road trips to New Jersey or Pittsburgh without food, without music and stories. And the first time I introduced them to Odds Bodkin, you could not hear anything in our car. You couldn't even hear them eating, they were so engrossed in the words.

KARLAAnd talking the power of stories, I would -- my husband would some pull up from work, he worked in DC, and I would find him staying in the car to listen to rest of Odds' stories. One of his favorites was "Midwinter Cherries." And he'd walk in the house reciting that story and he knew the story verbatim. But I kid you not, my kids -- we have four writers in our family and two verbal -- well, three writers in our family and two verbal artists who understand the power of story because of writers like Odds Bodkin. So I wanted to say thank you for your gift of language. It's been pretty incredible for our family.

BODKINKarla, you made my day.

NNAMDIWell, Karla, let's make his day some more. Because we got this e-mail from Anne in Westminster, Md., who says, "I love Odds Bodkin. My son listened endlessly to Odds Bodkin's stories growing up. All the Little Proto adventures in the Evergreens. He listened to "The Odyssey" when he was in 8th grade. When he started 9th grade, their first book in English class was "The Odyssey." He came home and told me he was going to own freshman English because he knew the story inside and out and he did.

NNAMDIHis only problem was hearing the English teacher pronounce the names differently than Odds, but of course, Odds' pronunciation were the correct ones. My son is in college now, but he still quotes lines from Little Proto and the Evergreens, and he is our family mythology expert." You're raising children.

BODKINMy day has been doubly made. Thank you so much.

NNAMDIKarla, thank you very much for your call. Here to Rob in Vienna, Va. Rob, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

ROBHi, thanks for having me. I had a question. I'm a huge fan of Irish storytelling and I was wondering if you -- when you began, if you gravitated toward any specific tradition of stories or storytelling?

BODKINHave you ever heard Robin Williamson, the Welshman, tell Irish stories, Rob?

ROBNo, I haven't.

BODKINHe was part of the incredible string band way back in the 1960s. He performs with a brass-stringed Celtic harp. I saw him once at St. Bartholomew's in London. And if you want to hear one of the great, great masters of the Celtic tale performed as they I think are meant to be, see if he's out there with recordings. I tell a series of Celtic stories myself and love them. But to your question, they are one of hundreds of scintillating mythological drawing points in the way I look at it.

BODKINAnd I found a very -- a few extremely beautiful ones that I recount and share and some very funny ones, but they are not my specialty. But I know that ancient draw that they have, that wondrous, ancient, woodsy power that the Celtic myths carry. The Tuatha De Dannon mythology is an entire mythos, similar to the Norse gods or the ancient Greek gods. It's a whole very little known pantheon out there. So I hope you pursue them.

NNAMDIRob, thank you very much for your call. We have time for at least one more. Here is Mark in Rockville, Md. Mark, your turn.

MARKHey, Kojo, thanks for taking my call. I love your show.

NNAMDIThank you.

MARKI'm also a parent and an educator and I've always considered myself a storyteller. I want to make people aware of a wonderful organization in DC, and I'm sorry if it was -- if it might have been mentioned earlier. I didn't tune in right at the beginning of your show. There's an organization called Speak Easy DC, which teaches people the art of storytelling and they have events every month at public venues were they get people up on stage telling stories. And I believe it's the third Tuesday of every month, but they have a website, speakeasy -- I'm sorry, speakeasydc.org. And it's just fantastic for anyone who likes to either...

NNAMDIGlad you brought it up. We have had Speak Easy on our show in the past, but I'm glad you pointed it out to our listeners again. We're running out of time pretty quickly, Odds, but you're known for being able to bring an epic poem to life, but now you've branched out into a new short format. Tell us about that.

NNAMDIYou're doing a version of The Christmas Carol with all the characters using only Dickens' word, the idea being to capture the author's idea in a one-hour time frame. You call them "From Tuxedo and Lectern."

BODKINUsually I sit in a chair surrounded by a forest of instruments and I perform with them. However, two new projects, an hour-long version of Romeo and Juliet, and an hour-long version of A Christmas Carol are performed in a tuxedo as I stand behind a lectern with these glasses...

NNAMDIThat's why it's called Tuxedo and Lectern.

BODKIN...sitting on my nose, sitting right where they are. Charles Dickens reduced his novella to an hour-long show and performed it himself with character voices starting in 1846. When I discovered this, I thought to myself, this is one of the best holiday stories ever. I'm going to try. And I'm going to be performing it 15 or 20 times starting in about a week.

NNAMDII'm afraid that's all the time we have. Odds Bodkin is an award-winning storyteller and children's author. So good to see you again. Thank you so much for joining us.

BODKINThanks so much.

NNAMDI"The Kojo Nnamdi Show" is produced by Diane Vogel, Brendan Sweeney, Tara Boyle and Michael Martinez, and Ingalisa Schrobsdorff, with assistance from Kathy Goldgeier, Elizabeth Weinstein. Diane Vogel is the managing producer. Our engineer today, Timmy Olmstead. Dorie Anisman is on the phones. Thank you all for listening. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.