Tag Archives: Brian Ellis

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Brian Ellis returns to SCSU as Charles Darwin

Brian Ellis as Charles Darwin

Here is a great opportunity for all ages!  Check out this event announcement from The Library at St. Cloud State University: 

Award winning Chicago-area storyteller Brian “Fox” Ellis returns Feb. 11 and 12 to the Library at St. Cloud State University to help celebrate Charles Darwin’s birthday.

Ellis will perform “Charles Darwin and His Revolutionary Idea” at 4:30 p.m. Feb. 11 and again at 7 p.m. Feb. 12 in the Miller Center Auditorium. Each hour-long performance will be followed by informal conversation with Darwin in the Miller Center’s fireplace lounge. Both are free and open to the public.

Ellis recreates an evening at London’s Royal Geological Society with Darwin, shortly after the naturalist’s famous around-the-world journey on the HMS Beagle, which set sail from England on Dec. 27, 1831, returning home almost five years later.

Ellis applies his own training as a science teacher and his many years developing his craft as a storyteller to capture the spirit and intensity of the young Darwin, who was born Feb. 12, 1809. (The night of Ellis’s performance would be Darwin’s 205th birthday). As props in his performance, Ellis uses samples of fossils, insects, plants and animal skins to help the audience share in the sense of discovery that Darwin himself experienced.

In addition to these two performances, Brian Ellis will be visiting with hundreds of students in classes on Feb. 11, 12, and 13.

In October, Brian Ellis performed as Edgar Allan Poe to a standing-room only crowd in the Library at  St. Cloud State University. He has been touring the world telling stories and researching his subjects since 1980. He is the author of more than a dozen books, including award winning children’s books and lesson plans. To learn more about Brian Ellis, visit his website at http://www.foxtalesint.com.

The Library at St. Cloud State University provides scholarly resources and support services to the students, faculty and the university community as well as to the St. Cloud community. To learn more, visit the library’s homepage at http://lrts.stcloudstate.edu/library. Information on Brian Ellis’s visit and other Library programming is available at http://stcloud.lib.mnscu.edu/subjects/guide.php?subject=LibraryPublicProgramming

As mentioned above, Ellis performed as Edgar Allan Poe in October.  His performances were well-attended and very popular among high school and college students alike.  You can check out our recap here.

General, School Media Specialist

The Ghost of Edgar Allan Poe event at SCSU

poe_event_scsuBack in May, and again in September, CMLE sent an email to our K-12 members advertising an opportunity to attend free events on the St. Cloud State campus. Last week one of those events took place. The “Ghost of Edgar Allan Poe” visited the campus and 250 high school students were able to enjoy stories about Poe’s life. The actor, Brian Ellis, also recited a few of Poe’s most famous works like The Tell-Tale Heart and The Raven. The students even jumped in their seats when Fortunato screamed during the re-telling of The Cask of Amontillado.

A special “Thank You” to Dean Mark Vargas and the St. Cloud State Library for providing this free event and collaborating with CMLE to make it available to the schools in our region.