Thoughts about things I’ve written or read or heard or seen. An attempt to stay positive in a turbulent world.
Recent Articles
John Clare, gardener and writer; and Bloom & Wild
In this strange spring and early summer of ours, where March’s snow, frost and ice stopped all plant growth and May’s hot days and tropical rainstorms encouraged it wildly, I’ve been wondering how many writers worked as gardeners. I only found one: John Clare. John Clare, 13 July 1793-20 May 1864 (aged 70) by William Hilton, oil on canvas, 1820...Continue reading→
Writers on writing, and an exquisitely beautiful tea
When our writers’ group met this week one of our number described how the rise of the ‘plotting and typing’ approach to writing was driving her demented. How all the work is done before you’ve typed a word and then you just carry on thwacking through, typing typing typing … .But how, however much is planned ahead...Continue reading→
RMS Titanic: on this day 106 years ago … & Samira Addo, Portrait Artist of the Year
It’s 106 years ago today that the ‘unsinkable’ passenger liner, RMS Titanic, hit an iceberg and sank in just two hours and forty minutes. For years the tragedy was a matter of private internal horror: people didn’t talk about trauma then and only two years later the First World War broke out, eclipsing Titanic’s tragedy with its own tremendous...Continue reading→
Social media and the writer; Modigliani and Akhmatova
It’s wise for writers to have a social media presence these days. Publishers don’t exactly insist on it, but they like writers who have significant followings. (Followers equal interest in the writer and so potential sales, obviously.) But how does a writer balance the time she spends on social media and the time she devotes to...Continue reading→
Teaching kids to fall in love with science (a different kind of love for Valentine’s day); and things to do with rubbish
I was noodling around on the internet wondering what I was going to post about this month when I discovered Arvind Gupta. He won the Padma Shree on 26 January (India’s Republic Day) for his work in literature and in education, particularly scientific education. He’s an engineer, toy-maker, scientist, teacher and book-lover who spends much of his time...Continue reading→
A new writing resolution; and a new (to me) altruistic way of advertising
I’ve made a new writing resolution: I will not allow the confusing complexity, the sheer size and the constantly changing, shifting nature of a novel’s first draft to eclipse the excitement I felt when its guiding idea first electrified me. I. Will. Not. Ever. Again. Which means I’ll hang on to my curiosity however much confusion and chaos threaten to...Continue reading→
Our Christmas Tree: a work in progress … and The Connection at St Martin’s
My other half put our Christmas tree together yesterday (it has hundreds of branches, all with different colour codes, all with their own little slots in its metal trunk). He also strung the tree with lights. Now it’s my turn to put on the decorations. So it’s a work in progress.As everything is. Especially our lives. So...Continue reading→
Atul Gawande and Being Mortal; and a Remembrance Poppy Badge
Atul Gawande‘s Being Mortal – which I wrote about here in the context of his 2014 Reith Lectures – is extraordinary for its courageous and honest confrontation of our failure to confront how we want to die. Or, as Atul Gawande would say, from a surgeon doctor’s point of view: We’ve been wrong about what our...Continue reading→
Chaos & Creativity; and Beautiful Bookshops
I dislike hate chaos. Very much. Who doesn’t? But it’s an essential state if you want to write fiction. Messiness of the mind is the sine qua non for writers. But, when a piece is finished, it looks so orderly that we – when we first dream of becoming writers – think the process must also...Continue reading→
Rejection is a rite of passage for writers, and the Raw Chocolate Company
One of the things that a writer takes a while truly to believe (it’s taken me a while) is that rejection is part of the process: it’s necessary, inevitable and makes our work better. It’s a rite of passage.But the thing is, no piece of writing is born fully formed, just as no child is...Continue reading→
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