Wednesday 31 December 2014

Looking Forwards, Looking Back


This wonderful photograph of my paternal grandmother was taken on the eve of her marriage in 1891. I love the intent look on her face as she stands motionless in the photographer's studio; but what intrigues me more is what is in her mind - is she looking forwards to her new life or looking back on her old?

"Looking Forwards, Looking Back" is the working title of a section of the family history book I'm currently writing. But it also seems an appropriate motto for today - New Year's Eve, a time for planning ahead on the writing front but a time of reflection too. What has gone well over the past year, what (albeit small!) success has been achieved? I've learned a lot over this last twelve months and I'm very grateful to the poets and authors I've read and heard, to the tutors who have taught and challenged me on different courses, to my peers in writing groups who have commented on my work and supported me in it. 

But now to the future. I'm old enough and hopefully wise enough to avoid the "resolutions" trap (the tremendous initial burst of enthusiasm, the good intentions that bite the dust half way through January etc.) but some realistic planning before the odd drink later today may be in order - so watch this space!

Thursday 25 December 2014

Greetings


My idea of a perfect Christmas Day would be an early walk with the dog in crisp, bright sunshine, followed by a swift change into my onesie to spend the rest of the day by the fire with a liberal supply of chocolate, books and wine in the company of my nearest and dearest. However, as this doesn't appear to be a viable option in current circumstances, I am gearing up to do the necessary on a more traditional footing!

But wherever you are, however you choose to spend the day, however you celebrate whatever festival you celebrate - greetings and all best wishes for a happy, peaceful, enjoyable time.

Wednesday 10 December 2014

What inspires us?


I have always enjoyed the novels of Kate Mosse ("Citadel" being my favourite); at the moment I'm reading her collection of short stories, "The Mistletoe Bride And Other Haunting Tales". In addition to the stories themselves, I'm very interested in the author's notes that accompany each one. I am always keen to know the "story behind the story" - what was it in the writer's mind that conjured up the characters, the setting, the plot?

We are told that there are only seven basic plots for all the stories in existence - overcoming the monster, rags to riches, the quest, voyage and return, comedy, tragedy, rebirth. But how do writers build on these foundations to create what enthrals or appals us? What sparks their imagination, what inspires them to take a theme and to weave magic with it? Perhaps something as mundane as the look on a fellow passenger's face on the bus, an overheard scrap of conversation in a cafe, a solitary walk in the woods with the dog. A rich seam that I have frequently mined has been my own family history, where fact has often proved stranger than fiction!

Worcester 1956

Recently, in my poetry group Picaresque, we each took as a starting point for a poem a female character from a myth or legend. Whilst the underlying stories might have been well known, to see how each person imbued that character with something of themselves was a revelation. I have spent a lifetime fascinated by the River Severn (witness the above photo of me on one of my early childhood visits!) and a few years ago walked the 210 miles of the Severn Way with my husband and two dogs. So who else could I have chosen as my inspiration for that poem other than Sabrina (or Hafren in Welsh), a human child vengefully drowned in the river but resurrected as a nymph

  "... in that slow, gentle spawning
between the windswept thighs
of ancient hills at the bounds
of the nightingale's song."



The infant "Sabrina" on Plynlimon

I have an "ideas book" that goes everywhere with me in the day, sits beside my bed at night. In recent years it seems to have filled up alarmingly quickly - no shortage of inspiration but a severe shortage of time to translate that into coherent, finished pieces! Perhaps most of us who are "amateur" writers are just too busy living everyday life to write as much about it as we would like to, but maybe with the advent of 2015 ....