The Coliseum: storytelling, archetypes and place as icon

The Coliseum (Mayfield) is about the life of local Newcastle eccentric Leo Maley. After Leo’s death in 2000 it was discovered that this man who lived like a pauper, was in fact a millionaire. This fictional biography explores some of the stories that surround Leo, where memories of him have come to possess almost mythical status. Within The Coliseum these myths are at times counterbalanced by other stories, making the truth about Leo Maley as intangible as his reclusive life. The Coliseum (Mayfield) also reveals some of the many faces of Mayfield, as it exists within Newcastle; a place with perhaps as much ambiguity as Leo Maley himself. A critical and reflective exegesis The Coliseum: Storytelling, archetypes and place as icon follows the creative component. This work investigates the challenges associated with collecting oral histories, how people fit stories of their lives around their personal notions of archetype-in particular, the eccentric-and how these stories in turn reflect upon and influence change in the place in which they are told.