The Ostrich Principle
★★★☆☆ Powerful message
Scottish Storytelling Centre (Venue 30): Thurs 6 – Sun 30 Aug 2026
Review by Hugh Simpson
David Hughes and Kirsten Milliken’s The Ostrich Principle at the Scottish Storytelling Centre combines time-honoured storytelling techniques with urgent political issues, in a way that does not always knit together but has considerable effect.
A selection of stories, both from myth (Deirdre of the Sorrows) and history (the trial of Agnes Sampson) is told with skill and considerable atmosphere. Peggy Seeger’s Song of Choice, with its warning against political indecision and apathy, curls around the tales.
Kirsten Milliken in The Ostrich Principle. Pic: Hâle Denholm.
The performance level is carefully calibrated to fit the space and there is a precision to the storytelling that is remarkably impressive. Both Hughes and Milliken make the tales seem immediate and real, with no help from anything more technically advanced than the occasional thrumming on a bodhran.
The structure of the whole production perhaps lessens the stories’ impact rather than enhancing them. In an understandable desire to link them to the present day, there are explicit parallels drawn with current events, as well as much mention of doomscrolling. The ends of the stories are missed off and told later, which makes sense in terms of the extended metaphor but is a little unsatisfactory in practice.
There are warnings about standing by while the far right are on the rise (which is where the title comes in). These are timely and important, but they sometimes seem forced.
call to arms
The representations of social media excess in between the stories, meanwhile, don’t really work as satire, and only serve to lessen the atmosphere. The intrusion of technology breaks a spell (as it is no doubt intended to do), the starkness of the characters presented in these segments is at odds with the compassion shown elsewhere, and the jokes made at the expense of clickbait are rather lame.
Much of this is really an old-fashioned, consciousness-raising call to arms, but the two different parts of the performance never quite gel.
Kirsten Milliken and David Hughes in The Ostrich Principle. Pic: Hâle Denholm.
There seems to be a worry that the audience aren’t clever enough to tease out the messages themselves. For an audience to be participants in stories rather than passive consumers, as the performers recommend, would paradoxically be more likely if left to consider them for themselves rather than being lectured – however well-meaning that lecture may be.
The stories at the heart of this piece have real power, however, particularly when they are told with as much care and craft as they are here.
Running time: One hour (no interval).
Scottish Storytelling Centre (George Mackay Brown Library), 43-45 High St, EH1 1SR. (Venue 30).
Tuesday 11 – Saturday 22 August 2026.
Daily (not 12, 14, 16, 22): 6.15pm.
Tickets and details: Book here at EdFringe.com.
Tickets direct from venue: Book here.
Instagram: @davidhughesstoryteller.
ENDS
