These days, about 14 years later, he may be receiving superannuation, but continues to revel in story telling and encouraging children to embark on their own imaginative journeys, through reading.
"They can see the fun they can have with a book," he says.
Mr Joyce, who is based in Whakatane, is known professionally as "The Gardener" because of his enthusiasm for gardening.
He was back in action in Dunedin yesterday, presenting some of his favourite stories, to the delight of about 370 school pupils at a special assembly at Fairfield School.
He will tell more stories at Dunedin schools next week, as part of an Otago-Southland tour.
He narrates the stories of other writers, beginning his 45-minute presentation yesterday with Oscar Wilde's The Selfish Giant.
After initially telling stories at home to inspire his own children to do more reading, he began story telling in public, part-time, about 14 years ago.
At the height of his later full-time career, he was reading stories at three schools a day, and visiting 300 schools a year.
He later dropped to his present 200 a year after the pressures became too great.
"When I was doing three schools a day, I found it just about killed me. Now I do two schools a day."
Despite the popularity of computer games and television watching among young people, developing good reading skills remained critically important for their future, he said.
Fairfield School headmaster Andy Larson said Mr Joyce was "quite charismatic" and the pupils had clearly enjoyed yesterday's story telling..
