A Toronto-based storyteller, teacher, author and animator, Dan Yashinsky founded the Toronto Festival of Storytelling in 1979, and 1,001 Friday Nights of Storytelling in l978. He has been a featured performer and teacher at festivals in Austria, Germany, Israel, Ireland, Wales, Holland, England, Sweden, Singapore, Brazil, the U.S.A. and throughout Canada. He is the author of Suddenly They Heard Footsteps – Storytelling for the Twenty-first Century, which received the 2007 Anne Izard Storytellers’ Choice Award. In l999 he received the Jane Jacobs Prize for his work with storytelling in the community. He is currently the Storyteller-in-Residence at Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care. His latest book is Swimming with Chaucer – A Storyteller’s Logbook.