Tag Archives: writing

No such thing as ordinary

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Even as a baby at his uncle Amos’s printworks, David Almond had been attracted to words.But when he thought of becoming a writer, he found the neatness of printed books intimidating.

It looks so perfect – I’ll never do that.

He was an ordinary kid from an ordinary family in an ordinary street, he said. They had a few books and he would borrow from Felling Library: John Wyndham, myths and legends, Enid Blyton.

I used to think that writers had perfect minds.

But the books we see: Skellig, My Name is Mina,The true Tale of the Monster Billy Dean, started life as scruffy notebooks full of scribbles, doodles, and wonky fragments of handwritten text.

My books begin with a mess – more like the mess in the inside of my head.

He encouraged his young audience to play, to scribble and daydream and doodle. To let this thing called imagination run off in all directions. To learn to write by writing.

An empty page is like a sky – waiting for something to happen.

As well as the inspiration, there was honesty too. He got thirty three rejections for an adult’s novel he had spent five years creating and often carries a file full of rejection slips to talks. But he kept on writing. Wrote another book. Skellig.

The world is full of people who say, ‘Ah, you can’t do that.’

His face told you what he thought of nay-sayers.

He spoke of the barminess of English spelling, of the wonders that lie inside our heads and the really important things that the old myths tell us about ourselves. He spoke proudly of young people who read and write, of getting the mess in our heads down in straight lines on the page and the amazing things that happen as you read.

He wanted us all to enjoy the words on the page as sounds as well, as the words that people speak.

As he carried on, became his ten-year-old inside self going ‘Yes!’ because his name was in print; the boys on the front row uncrossed their arms. They listened and  responded, lost the shell of being blasé and became engaged.

If that’s ordinary, I really, really want to be ordinary too.

I’m just wild about Barry…

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We live in interesting times, Barry Cunningham asserted at the inaugural Hampshire Writers’ Group meeting on Tuesday 13th September 2011. Difficult not to nod agreement at that.

The electronic revolution means writers and publishers must pull together, not apart, he added. No problem – how could I not want to work with a man whom Barbara Large first met dressed as a giant friendly Puffin?

Although he admitted publishing was an unlikely cross between librarianship and gambling, the publication of children’s books has a serious purpose. The writer is ‘the secret friend of children’ to quote Cornelia Funke. We are there for them on the bus, we are them when they’re bullied,  we are there when life is too much – we provide other worlds to escape to, other ways of being.

His aim is to reach out to the bookhuggers, to connect with the emotional world of children’s reading – and so is ours.

How can we do this?

Our use of story, humour, credible dialogue, precise physicality and – food. Children have not changed since the Narnia books on that front. Kaye Webb believed you could tell one big fib – and after that the rest had to be consistent. Nothing to disagree with there.

And where to find the source?

Write for your inner child. That means reaching deep inside yourself to excavate the truth – and a great deal of trust in your editor.’Your family won’t know you as well as I do.’

Well, Mr Cunningham, I am up for that.

Facing the Truth

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Today, 3rd September 2011, I went toPallant House Art Gallery’s Open Day. This was an ‘artist’s date’ to use Julia Cameron’s term. Having reached the end of the first draft of my novel for the MA, my inspirational well was bone-dry.

I needed to make the most of it, so I took my time and explored David Jones’ Xtension exhibition and other artists’ work. The thing which struck me was the unashamed truthfulness of the best artworks. In ‘Icarus in Brighton’ there are beautiful nymphs or goddesses, the pier, the fallen young man – and a coke can. This ‘outsider artist’ showed what he saw in his mind’s eye.

I compared the ships of the naive artist Alfred Wallis with the other works of the St Ives artists represented in the collection.For me, his work has an unselfconscious strength. He wasn’t looking over his shoulder, wondering what critics might think. He created. That’s all.

I coughed up my £2.50 and went to see the Frida Kahlo & Diego Riviera Exhibition. I loved how Frida painted her own moustache with the same care as the lace round her neckline. She showed faces with warts, scabs, pouts and unplucked eyebrows.

Her husband said it all:

‘She tears open her heart and her chest to tell the biological truth about what she feels.’

As a writer, I aspire to such honesty, such ‘telling it as it is’. I think of Rembrandt’s later portraits – who would not aim for such truthfulness of compassion?

So that is my justification for observing closely a family drama played out in a cafe. I noted down the expressions, the phrases and the actions in order to convey emotions truthfully as I see them. I shamelessly dissected what was going on, remaining uninvolved and dispassionate ( I recall Kahlo trained to be a doctor). The point of such apparently callous behaviour is to get at the truth.

Squeamishness in a surgeon is something to be overcome – and I think it is also in a writer.

Mapping out the territory

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Swaledale Barn by Andy Coulson

A few years ago, we went on a giant pub crawl around the Yorkshire Dales. There was lot of laughing, rain , sheep, quaffing, rain, sheep, drystone walls, scenery and rain. My part in this adventure ( Four Go Mad in Swaledale sort of thing) was to mark out the route. Continue reading →

Sea glass

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Sea Glass by Alibee

Have you ever wondered at those TV archaeologists who pick up a tiny fragment of coarse pottery and declare that it’s a Bronze Age grog-tempered sherd – with absolute certainty? Now it maybe that these pieces have been planted to make them look clever for the camera – but I’ve seen it in the field so-to-speak at the Coppergate dig in York ( now the Jorvik Centre) . They are certain.

It’s down to ‘getting your eye in’ – recognising those tiny clues which convey exactly the right information. The same applies to sea glass hunting:

  • the minute differences between areas of shingle which will be productive and those which won’t
  • knowing  that beyond a brief poke with your toe, digging is a waste of time
  • learning the sound of the tides which will throw up more treasures

All this comes with acquiring  knowledge,  making comparisons and putting in lots of practice. Just like writing.

BUT

what about those disappointing days? The wading through treacle, can’t remember another word for ‘twist’, six hours to write six hundred word days? No apparent reason behind them – a failure of the scientific method with having no control over the variables. I sometimes wonder if it is phase of the moon.

Well, the point is to keep searching. To go down every day and look. Sometimes I get only a splinter or two – bits of characters’ speech or a glimpse of a scene. Other days  I might find  a bit of gorgeous Bristol Blue – rare but gorgeous – like when a sub-plot all falls into place. or  it might be a slab of soft green – like a good solid chapter.

Who knows? I won’t find it if I don’t look.

Town

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Ludlow Castle by Rachel Clarke

I much enjoyed the first episode of ‘Town’ with Nicholas Crane. I appreciated  how he used the history and geography of Ludlow to deepen our understanding of its current success. For me, any book is better with a sense of the history and geography of its setting.  I love books with maps and chronologies. I want to believe there were reasons the first settlers chose that spot, and places where decisive battles took place or people worshipped – no matter how imaginary the setting.

But I also appreciated how he looked at the council estate and the amateur boxing club as well as the listed buildings and farmers’ markets. He didn’t just stick to niceness and Michelin starred restaurants,  nor was he condescending. He gave a good ( if a little short) portrait of the difficulties and vigour of life on the ‘wrong side of the tracks’.

Today I went to Emsworth. This is a not-dissimilar town in Hampshire. Here the ‘other sort’ live on the opposite side of the by-pass. In the main town, the plummy ones hang round outside artisan bakeries  and the tattooed people come through the underpass to investigate the charity shops. Wandering about waiting for my bus and observing made me think how a writer could use this. I came up with one thought.

Drop your characters in it.

Stick’em in the wrong milieu. On one hand, you could end up with some strong plot drivers. They experience life on the other side – does it lead to fear and panic; embarrassment and humour; class-hatred and slow-brewing revenge, or envy and aspiration?

On the other, you could reveal character. How do they react to other social conventions; are they ready to adapt or condemn? And how do people from another social class see them? All very indicative – without you ‘telling’ a thing.

You could do both.

Not to mention the dimensions of time and space  you could play with. Lots of fun to be had in town.

No right to be published.

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Where we meet - photo by CrunchCandy

Today ( Thursday the 21st July) was one of the periodic meetings of the SCBWI Chichester twig. We were a mixed bunch: Penny already published, Kathy agented, me with a shiny new Post Graduate Diploma and Neil right at the beginning of his journey. One thing we have in common: we want people to read our work – otherwise we are sending words into the void.

The purpose of our little group, as I see it, is fairly straightforward: mutual support. There is a great sense of energy, which I find particularly stimulating, and plenty of encouragement.

Let’s look at that last word: encouragement. It’s not a blanket ‘there, there, dear, everything you write is lovely and it’ll soon be published’. It means inspiring with valour, the brave spirit in your heart. Going by some of the posts I’ve read about the state of publishing,  we all need valour. We need valour to put our work out there, we need valour to revise it for the umptieth time, we need valour to deal with the rejections which are an inevitable part of our chosen path.

This is where the wider pool of SCBWI -BI and our other writer-support networks come in. We need the on-line stimulus; the face-to -face honesty of critique meets; the CPD of conferences, workshops and retreats. It’s good to know there are others on our side, others who have made it in one way or another, others who can help.

But all this only works if we can give and take in the right spirit. If we are open to analytical and purposeful criticism, if we take care how we handle our colleagues’ feelings, then we will grow as a group. And that nurturing, which may include some pretty tough love at times, will help us all along the road. It will not guarantee a print run. That’s down to us and fate.

I’ll finish with a quotation from Thomas Edison (thank you R. J. Ellory)

‘Many of life’s failures are people who did not realise how close they were to success when they gave up.’

Our job is to keep our pals going.

In concert

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We all need encouragement.

A church with no parish on a wet lunchtime in Chichester – not somewhere you would expect stimulation for writing, perhaps. But experiencing the thrilling She’koyokh klezmer band led me to some thoughts about books, writers and readers.

The band came on stage in fine style. Your eye was taken by the violinist in rich red satin and cobwebby lace, or the clarinettist – a white-suited woman in a glossy black hat. You might favour the django guitarist with Roma-dark hair or the bass player – a Georgian vampire or pirate with his long hair, waistcoat and watch chain. An appearance of otherness, of exciting, glamorous colour, of being more draws you in. That’s what I’d want right from outset in in a book cover – to reflect my individuality of voice .

Then there was the theatre of the performance. It was heightened; it was hyper-real – but not just for show. The two young women duelled across the stage, smiling and reacting to each other’s playing. The young men nodded frowned, responded -there was an exchange going on about the music itself. I would wish that from my writing – to have drama and a certain degree of showiness to pull the reader inside the world I’ve made for sharing.

One of the most popular moments was the opportunity to join in. I had never sung the chorus before – but the melody was familiar enough to follow. It had a shape I could recognise – but enough difference from tunes I already knew to be entertaining. My writing needs to do this on both structural and emotional scales – the pattern of the story telling needs to be there for the reader to follow, and the music to bring their hearts along for the ride.

Finally, there was the exuberance of different traditions brought together: it’s not every day you hear Yiddish sung in a neo-classical preacher’s church. I loved how Greek and Turkish music conjoined beautifully. It brought both vigour and delight. I long for my stories to bring disparate strands together in a satisfying whole.

I believe that’s what in concert really means.

The Song Remains The Same

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Hazel and Emily

The afternoon of 3oth June I had the pleasure of seeing The Askew Sisters at St John’s Church as apart of the Chichester Festivities. They were two lively young women  who played spirited dance music and sang moving ballads and the like. Delightful – and if you get the chance, do go see them.

But one thing stood out – they sprang from English tradition – and I love it, whether in music or stories.

Now the minute I mention an English tradition, there will be hackles going up. It seems almost impossible to mention without anxiety. Will people think I am a racist? Will I be bracketed along with the tweeness of Evergreen Magazine, Ye Olde Teashoppes and endless reruns of Miss Marple? Will I be seen as an obscure collector of folklore obsessively slotting stories into the Aarne–Thompson classification system?

I hope not.

But what I am speaking up for is best expressed by this:

And we learn to be ashamed before we walk

Of the way we look and the way we talk.

Without our stories and our songs

How will we know where we’ve come from?

Show of Hands 'Roots'  - a deeply-felt and much loved song.

We need our traditions – how can you  riff on Jack and The Beanstalk if you don’t know the story in the first place? Ms J K Rowling would lose at least half the inhabitants of the Potterverse without our English traditions.

But there’s every need to avoid overzealous exactitude.

The thing I admired about the Askew Sisters was their reinvigoration of the music. Hazel played the melodeon with the heel of her hand at one point to give an otherworldly sound – not textbook, I suspect – but very effective. I loved The Warsaw Village Band’s punky polkas* ( also ChiFest and brilliant live) and what about the Imagined Village’s fantastic ‘Cold Haily Windy Night’  with Sheema Mukherjee on sitar and Johnny Khalsi on drums? The point is that folk music evolves, new elements come in and add life. Having a tradition doesn’t mean it has to be a form of taxidermy.

So where’s the relevance to writing?

Well, it can hardly be shared experience nowadays – not many pirate adventures like Henry Martin now – unless you’re Somali. But shared emotion – that’s where we meet. We may not have a lover on the deck of a sailing ship as in ‘The Turtledove’ or ‘If I were a Blackbird’ – but we know what it is to miss someone.

Writers convey the feelings of characters in situations they have never experienced and readers imagine them. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a ballad or a book – and the English tradition has plenty of passion in it yet.

[*Yes, I know they’re Polish – but the point about reinventing your tradition is still true.]

Three for tea

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Today was the inaugural meeting of Chi-SCBWI ( Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators – Chichester Branch – or more of a twig). Present were the ever busy and talented Kathryn Evans; published author, Chichester Creative Writing MA graduate and kindly cat carer Penelope Bush; and me. Due to a car disaster, the amazingly prolific Elizabeth Dale was there only in spirit this time.

Our venue was St Martin’s Organic Tearooms. I had never been in this ancient and frankly eccentric building before. Being early, I spent a few happy moments on the rickety staircases and across the amiably sagging floors just looking. It was delightfully quirky: individual and inspiring.

My colleagues arrived. They rather suited the building – distinctive and wonderfully themselves . One published (big in Germany, I believe), one agented and me the one setting out: yet all of us with something in common. We discussed our aims for the group – social, supportive  and a safe place to let off steam. Despite our different lives, we were all aware of the potential isolation of our craft.

OK nowadays we have Twitter and Facebook and all that stuff yet it is all too easy to dwell on things, to imagine, to read subtext in emails that just isn’t there. But face-to-face – lovely.  Genuine warmth and hugs and gentle lifts of the eyebrows that convey so much – and oh-so-endearing moments of uncertainty and mutual support. Not pushing a brand or a self-promotion opportunity. Great – energetic people are energising.

More of the same please- 10 am Thursday 21st July, St Martin’s Tearooms, St Martin’s Street Chichester – love to see more artists and illustrators there.