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- First drafts: allowing the worm to navigate the soils of your mind
- The boy whose butter I ate: writing from the inside out
- All a writer can ask
- Throwing away material without a sense of failure
- Playful child and iron teacher: the two halves of the writer
- What happens when a character’s skirt gets hitched in her knickers?
- It’s an anxious job, pulling out of the comfort zone
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Tag Archives: Gabriela
Sometimes, you just have to get over yourself
There’s nothing like a high-five from a published poet, especially if it’s the gifted Clare Shaw, to help you get over yourself. So, I’ve written this poem, I tell Clare and Jim Friel and the other writers gathered in the … Continue reading
Posted in Essay, Poetry
Tagged A Posthumous Affair, Arvon, Clare Shaw, Creative writing, Gabriela, Gabriela Blandy, Head On, how to write, Jim Friel, Jonathan Lee, Poetry, The Hurst, Writing, writing advice, Writing process
19 Comments
What’s the problem with being up a mountain with no phone signal or orienteering skills?
It has begun to rain. The wind comes in cycles – building, building – so that at its peak my body wobbles and I contemplate the steepness below me: images of tumbling headfirst down lumps and bumps, through sharp grass. … Continue reading
Posted in Essay, Memoir, Travel
Tagged Adventure, advice, fear, Feeling, Gabriela, Gabriela Blandy, Health, How to, Laurence Sterne, Memoir, North Wales, Thought, travelling, truth, Wales, Writing, writing advice, Writing process
31 Comments
Shouldn’t I be able to use all my published books as furniture by now?
I have recently been on a hunt for Alice Munro. When I reached the Canadian border the other week, a lady in the passport control booth asked me where I was heading. Goderich, I told her, grinning ludicrously about … Continue reading
Posted in Essay, Memoir, Travel
Tagged Alice Munro, Gabriela, Gabriela Blandy, How to, Natalie Goldberg, sense of a journey, short story, Writing
43 Comments
Playful child and iron teacher: the two halves of the writer
I was nine when a new games mistress arrived at my school. She was a grey-haired woman, although she wasn’t old; I could tell because her eyebrows were black. Her bum was boxlike, giving an impression of very little waist. … Continue reading
Posted in Essay, Memoir
Tagged advice, editing, essay, fear, Gabriela, Gabriela Blandy, how to write, Memoir, Writer's block, Writing, writing advice, Writing process
39 Comments
What happens when a character’s skirt gets hitched in her knickers?
Character is arguably the single most important component of the novel…nothing can equal the great tradition of the European novel in the richness, variety and psychological depth of its portrayal of human nature. David Lodge When I was ten, … Continue reading
Posted in Essay, Memoir
Tagged advice, Character, Characterisation, David Lodge, editing, essay, Gabriela, Gabriela Blandy, how to write, Memoir, short story, Writing, writing advice, Writing process
56 Comments
Gabriela Blandy - The sense of a journey 