The Creative Identity

Short Story Competition Update

The very girlie and cute notebook that holds all compo-related work. It's been two-and-a-bit weeks since the Short Story Competition closed. I spent the first ten days reviewing my plan for producing the anthology. I am now dealing with the registration as a publisher, buying of ISBNs, drafting of the publishing contract that will be sent to the winners, sourcing of printing services, budgeting and so on... But I've also started to read all of these entries. I am thrilled that an overarching theme for the anthology will emerge once I've been through all of your stories. Today therefore seems like a good day to be talking about matters of style, grammar and presentation as I've detected a few problems that really should not be there. And before anyone freaks out, read this: nobody is getting canned for anything that I shall list on here. Let me repeat that one: I shall not bin any entry on the basis of what you read below, but stick with me while I tell you about these blunders and the reason for doing so. The entry form existed for a reason, as did the clear guideline that stated: 'Please add a footer to your story with the page number and the title only'. In the entry form you put all of your personal details including the title of your story; in the footer, just the page number and the title. This is done so that, upon receipt, the reader can immediately separate the... Read more →

Seven Links

Oh how I love these sort of posts guys... I read about it at Amelia's and Sus's online digs and just had to do it. Here's the gist: link to six posts from within your site and to one written by someone else. The idea is to give your readers another chance to look at your work and to find some other great writer in the process. Enjoy and do play. Leave a message with the link to your post on your site. My first post, Whose Identity? – 1 Feb 2010. The post I enjoyed writing the most, Ignore At Your Peril. A post with a great discussion, I Don't Have Time To Write. A post on someone else's blog which I wish I had written, Remember Who You Are. My most helpful post, How To Go For Pro. A post with a title I am prod of, Licence to Write. A post that I wish more people had read, The Magic of Art. Read more →

Try This

Thoughts fly and words go on foot. Therein lies the drama of a writer. –Julien Green– Ah Friday, my favourite posting day! I love it when I have to come up with a little writing prompt because, despite the philosophical beauty of theory, there is nothing like writing itself. This week I've told you a bit about Roald Dahl and his suggestions for aspiring writers and on Wednesday I interviewed the first artist to be featured on here. Today I would like you to apply one of Dahl's ideas, but do not sit on it, do not wait for the perfect pictures, do no wait for inspiration, do not wait for the perfect day at all. Make some time tonight or at lunchtime and try this: Build a very small character-board: get a magazine, cut out one image of a person, and three images of items that this person owns. Do this really quickly. Stick these down in your notebook and write 'There was no possibility of taking a walk that day'. Now use all of this as your prompt for a short, short story of 600 words max. Read more →

Stephanella Meets Amelia Critchlow

WARNING: as always with my interviews, I am biased, but this time I am biased even more, I am biased to the nines, I am biased times two. I met Amelia last year when we did Unravelling together, but we really hooked up at the beginning of this year, when she passed me on to her dad for some admin work he required. Her dad, Professor Critchlow, is so unbelievably kind, down to earth and amiable that Amelia herself immediately 'made sense', if you get my drift (gosh, I feel like speaking in clichés today... bring them on!). Amelia is an artist whose online showcase is rich and multi-faceted. From textile to paper-based work, from 3D models to little cute labels, she moves into a creative land filled with joy and self-expression and often punctured by little lost creative sheep whom she inspires weekly. If you too are the sort of blog-reader who follows link after link late at night, wondering why on earth not trying that and that and that as well, then you'll find plenty to coax you into art at Amelia's place. Today she answers my questions about her writing identity because... wouldn't it be interesting to know how a visual artist approaches her writing? Let's see, shall we? What is your idea of perfect writing? My idea of perfect writing is something that is 'different' from the norm. Something that is written from the heart, and something that encourages one to think. I enjoy works such... Read more →

Roald Dahl's Ideas to Help Aspiring Writers

I think I may have said already that I never read children's books as a child. The only one that was forced on me was Little Women which, to this day, I still dislike. I just couldn't like any of those girls. Meg, whose greatest aspiration was building a family (are you kidding, did she not want to read, work, paint, travel?); Beth, whose prolonged, bed-ridden Dickensian demise was the stuff of tear-jerking nightmares (could she not have fallen off a horse and split her neck?); Amy, whose air-headedness, pardon my worldliness, could have been done so much better (in fact, it was, in Legally Blonde) and finally Jo, the one who should have fired me up and whom, instead, I found so off-putting with her lack of grace and subtlety that I just couldn't believe Laurie had a crush on her... Why oh why reading this stuff, I thought, when I could read what adults read, say Dracula? Thus I skirted everything supposedly child-friendly, eager to grow up and read 'better stuff'. And so it went that it wasn't until my early twenties that I discovered Roald Dahl. I had always been aware of him, attracted as I was by the magnificent drawings on the covers of his books (oh the awesome Quentin Blake...!), but of course I had been very careful to avoid it, because that was stuff for little children. Clearly. As I turned twenty-four or so I bought The Roald Dahl Treasury and have since read... Read more →