Yamanba - (or, She’ll be Coming Round the Mountain)
told byLaura Sampson
A tree floats down a river from the mountain and becomes a sacred statue: compassion personified.
At the river’s source squats an old, old lady whose fury can eat you alive, or keep you as safe as if you yourself were the mountain.
People call her a demon - but once she was a goddess.
Maybe.
For years, the figure of Yamanba has led Laura a merry dance round the mountain to the myths, legends, folktales and parables of East Asia - plus the outer reaches of her own unenlightened mind - chasing the echo of a being that can still, if she chooses, raise holy hell.
Laura Sampson is a London-based storyteller, writer and noh practitioner, whose mixed heritage and myth studies have taken her on many adventures. She tells stories of surreal situations, big emotions and underestimated old ladies, from various parts of the world.
