More than Writers

  I’m now into the fifth year of running a local creative writing group — a role that is delightful and rewarding in equal measure. As the group has become more established, my challenge has shifted to finding fresh and engaging aspects of writing for us to explore together. I usually introduce a topic for discussion, followed by prompts to trigger some writing, which often produces excellent results both in our sessions and in between meetings. Recently, we explored the sonnet and its structure — quite advanced stuff! — and it prompted some of the group to create their own modern sonnets. That session was sparked by this description from Scottish poet Don Paterson: As poetry moved slowly off the tongue and onto the page, the visual appeal of an approximately square field of black text on a sheet of white paper must have been impossible to resist. Which is what the sonnet is, first and foremost: a small, square poem … a sonnet is a paradox, a little squared circle, a mandala ...

  Life is the source of inspiration for our writing but sometimes life knocks us off course and puts us in such a spin that writing is nearly impossible. A phone call out of the blue in late January was such an event. It shattered my peace and spun my head into chaos. I have struggled to think straight since.    Last month I was rescued by the lovely  Annmarie  Miles, when I admitted at the last minute that I was unable to think clearly or write. Thank  you, Annmarie , you did an excellent job. This month my blog is  being submitted l ate and my mind still a bit scrambled.    It’s not just the blog that has been affected. My plans to move forward with the Myka stories have also suffered : n o marketing plan has been launched ;  no social media campaign was embarked on. Instead of putting myself out there, I sighed and cried and prayed. But I have not given up .  Myka the fictional dog is still wagging her tail and hoping I’ll finish...

I had been sitting at my desk, trying to write a story about Thomas, the disciple. I was feeling sorry for the man who seemed to be remembered mainly for his doubt. I had done my background reading and prayed about it, but still nothing was coming, so I prayed again. When I say ‘prayed’ I was actually telling God that I was struggling and it would be far more effective if he just dictated what I had to say, plus no one would really be interested in my writing and the book would probably never get published anyway. As I waited in silence, it dawned on me that I was sounding like a spoilt child who didn’t want to do her homework, so I asked for his forgiveness. He had put this project on my heart and so I’d do it. It’s strange how he hardly ever responds as I would expect him to. This time two Bible verses embedded themselves in my mind. ‘God loves a cheerful giver.’ That hit hard. I was cheerful enough giving financially and timewise to other people but I wasn’t cheerful about givin...

How to describe the past two weeks? Almost, but not quite, laid up with the worst cold I’ve had for years. Normally in recent years, a cold would hold me back at night (when tablets would need to be swallowed so I could sleep in comfort), but during the day, apart from making sure there were plenty of tissues to hand, I’d be carrying on with whatever schedule my day held. This time, I was forced into drastic measures: a visit to the local Spar shop for daytime cold remedies (16 tablets). A whole box of tissues had been used up by my frantic nose-blowing, so a new box had to be bought. The two items came to a grand total of £11 – I held my bank card to the machine without a murmur. Before those of you used to cheaper products say (or write) anything, I will point out I was on Iona. Supposed to be on retreat – concentrating on ‘higher things.’ Now I am on my last full day as I write this, I am feeling (and sounding, I’m told) better. The weather is even improving in that we’ve gone most ...

      Dolphins gamboling in a calm sea ‘The mind at rest produces holy and mysterious thoughts, like dolphins gambolling above a calm sea.’       Heyscius of Batos, an early monastic writer I’ve not been lucky enough to see a school of dolphins in the wild, only in a ‘show’. The beauty of their lithe forms executing perfectly synchronised parabolic paths above the waves is so satisfying. It’s not at all surprising that the ancient Greeks thought of the dolphin as a symbol of life. (I feel I should apologise for the very stationary dolphins in the picture; pressing the camera button at precisely the right moment to catch them in the air was quite beyond me.) The quote is from an ancient book about prayer. It describes beautifully the experience of having a new thought during a time of waiting on God, but it’s also an apt description of a moment of writerly inspiration. A fresh idea may suddenly strike us out of nowhere and it’s so compelling ...

St Paul is scathing in his criticism of those who suppress the truth…as was Jesus before him…and Isaiah before Christ. ‘The wrath of God is revealed against all…who suppress the truth in unrighteousness’ Rom 1v18 ‘Woe to you scribes (interesting?) and Pharisees! For you shut the door of the kingdom of heaven against men; you neither go in yourselves nor permit others who are entering to go in’ Matt 23v13 ‘Truth has fallen in the public square’ Is 59v14 When Mao, Stalin, and Hitler burned books, the world witnessed the power of dictatorships to suppress the truth. Watching Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 - the temperature that paper burns - at school was a good use of education. Like all of us, I am watching the development of AI with interest. My antennae are twitching, trying to sift, discern, weigh, not condemn wholesale…but there’s more than one way to dictate what others are permitted to read or not. Burning books is one way. Preventing good literature (and awful literature) fr...