Walking with Camels: A Cure for Madness

Tony Howson was born in Slough, UK, on November 14, 1956. Since then, he has lived in 30 different homes around the world and experienced a life of storytelling. He currently lives in Turkey with his wife and daughter. Tony also has three sons and two grandchildren. He worked as a journalist in broadcast and print, but for 25 years has been active in international development, training journalists in Africa, Middle East, former Soviet Union and Asia to make programmes that empower local people and support media development. He has an honorary doctorate for services to journalism from Uzhgorod University in Ukraine. Outside of journalism he has delivered poetry readings and storytelling sessions and courses to help others develop their techniques. He has had a previous collection of poems and essays published, and had work included in anthologies. He has also had three photo exhibitions, held in the UK and Ukraine. One exhibition supported a production of his four-voice performance piece, SHUSH!, performed in Scarborough, one of his favourite home towns. His formative years were spent on Teesside, once known for its steel and chemical industries. He went on to report its decline in the 1980s. He has also contributed to community arts, helping to set up Scarborough Flair, a project leading to a series of productions, based around the spoken word. Other activities included supporting mental health organisations and establishing a pioneering victim-offender mediation project in Sheffield.