JILL Lamede, founder of the Maia Project based in Camelford, is looking for donations for a new storytelling project for children’s hospices.

Jill, who calls herself the Tintagel Storyteller, is looking for donations for a crowdfunding project to bring storytelling to the Children’s Hospice’s respite centres in Devon and Cornwall.

She said: “Traditional oral storytelling is a wonderfully healing art form and it would be fantastic if every children’s hospice could have a resident storyteller on call. The sick children and their families need the pleasure, inspiration and magic that stories can bring. But the power of storytelling has largely been forgotten.”

Jill has voluntarily visited two children’s hospice centres in Devon and Cornwall, but they are both an hour’s drive away.

She added: “I cannot afford to become their resident storyteller unless I can find some sponsorship from somewhere, so I am trying crowdfunding and am open to suggestions for other sources.”

The going rate of pay for a storyteller in schools in the area is around £200 a day. For Jill’s project, she has halved this amount, meaning that £5,000 would fund a two-year residency offering 50 days of storytelling.

Jill will also be offering additional visits at her own expense, and she will be writing a blog and report so that other storytellers can be encouraged to visit their local hospices and potential funders can be informed about the benefits of such residencies.

She said: “Somewhere there must be someone who wants to help the hospices, understands the power of stories and can afford to sponsor me in this project.”