More than Writers

And it came to pass that a shy girl discovered the Internet, and there within was a chance to pursue writing with something called a Blog, which is to say a Weblog. And behold, the shy girl found that she could write about things that interested her. And, in the beginning, that included riveting things like nail varnish and whether the beans should actually ON the toast and whether sweetcorn is an abomination unto the Lord.  The shyest of the shy girls considered not that people would actually be reading the Blog and very quickly, she moved on from nail varnish, which she could never get to last for more than 16 minutes anyway, and she began to write about the deepest darkest questions of our time.  But I say unto thee that this is a lie because when she began to write about the solutions to the human condition, she found that she was rubbish at it. Indeed, her words were as dust. So, mainly, she stuck to her human condition and what the love of a good God could do about it. A...

     I’ve been dipping into the Winter Olympics, intrigued by some of the sports included. I still haven’t got my head round the intricacies of curling, and as for the luge doubles, I struggle to see how the person underneath can breath, let alone contribute to controlling the run! I'm amazed at the levels attained by some of the athletes, it is a world full of glory for some, disappointment for others. What they all have in common is a story of how they got the where they are, each one different but each with elements of sacrifice, singlemindedness, hard work and opportunity. When I tell you that back in September my son completed a 5k run, you may well be underwhelmed. It is the story behind this achievement though that makes it worthy of a mention. Two years previously he suffered an injury playing football. One of the main ligaments in his knee was torn (the ACL). This meant he could no longer use that leg properly. He was on crutches for months and living on his ow...

I have been making my way through Psalm 119, the longest Psalm in the Bible and was interested in the heading of the section I was reading: ‘Mem’. Research revealed that the Hebrew origins of this word are ‘sea, chaos, and unknown’. (Apparently, the sea was viewed as an unknown quantity to be feared.) I love the way this leads into His commandments being my constant guide. It makes me think about a map, how on a journey to an unknown place we need to know which direction to take. These days we hav e sat   nav systems or apps on our phones – with a voice of our choosing – telling us where to go .   But I’m a bit old-fashioned and not fully confident with technology, so I like to print out a route-finder. Sometimes, on a walk with a friend, we follow a guide that tells us to ‘turn up the track next to the big oak tree’, or ‘climb the stile and walk up the hill’.   There’s something comforting and reassuring in being able to read the directions – and re-read it if I think I ...

  Back in September I wrote a piece for MTW on Word Blending using the image of making wine and blending grapes.   It so happens that I am back in South Africa currently and have just had a relaxing holiday in the Robertson wine valley, two hours out of Cape Town.   Below the equator,  t he start of the year marks the harvest season for grapes.   Wine makers begin the challenging task of selecting the best grapes, choosing how to ferment them (oak barrels – first, second or third fill? – French for ‘oakiness’ or American for vanilla; stainless steel tanks; cement ‘eggs’) and how, or whether, to blend them and in what proportions for maximum flavour etc. As I walked through some of the vineyards here, I noticed that many of the vine rows have been wrapped in netting.   There are a number of reasons for this: To protect them from birds.   The closer to harvest, the more sunshine the vines have had which increases the sugar content of the grapes and there...

  The local writing group I set up comprises of; some complete beginners who know nothing about writing, a lady who has written many long novels but not yet published, a poet, a writer who can’t place herself but has written great drama in our meetings, those hoping to become memoir writers, and some who used to write and are finding their way back. At present, I am the leader of the group of twelve ladies. Most come to each monthly meeting. The preferred format is for each person to read out their ‘homework’, everyone to comment on it and then turn to the next subject, which is whatever I have prepared to talk about and discuss. Everybody reads and everybody discusses, the comments are encouraging and I am the only one who has missed a homework task. And the writing from everyone is thoughtful and of good quality. I can hardly keep up with their enthusiasm and it’s great fun. For the last session our previous homework had been on dialogue and this led quite neatly to talking...

  Let me start at the very beginning. You will often hear people say - everyone has a book in them … This is not true. Others will tell you – I’m going to write a book when I retire … Most of them don’t. This is because writing a book is a marathon, not a sprint. It takes months of creativity, weeks of editing, time to work through the comments of beta readers and the editor and ends with continual marketing. So, if you have completed writing a novel and whatever state it is in or stage it is at, congratulations. You should be very proud of yourself. Let us now assume you have written a novel. You have self-edited it to the best of your ability (always a fraught process). You have asked some members of your writing group, or book group to read it (always a terrifying process). You have worked through the manuscript editing again to take account of the useful comments of those beta readers and now you decide how to get your book into the world (always a daunting process). There ...

“The human heart is so delicate and sensitive that it always needs some tangible encouragement to prevent it from faltering in its labour. The human heart is so robust, so tough, that once encouraged it beats its rhythm with a loud unswerving insistency.” Maya Angelou  The late Maya Angelou’s wise words offer a rich starting point for reflection. My focus today is on the theme of encouragement — something we all need, in our work, our family life, and, of course, in our creative efforts. I am convinced that encouragement engenders far better results than criticism, perhaps especially in writing. None of us enjoys being told that we are not very good at something. Most of us are already our own harshest critics, and we would do well to be far more bullish when it comes to self-worth — again, particularly in creative work.  The word encouragement itself is revealing. It comes from Old French, dating back to the mid-fourteenth century, and can be traced to the verb encoragi...

  In this blog I am going to explore some more about my quest to write a children’s book. New readers are advised to look back at earlier blogs for context. My first draft of the story was very raw and had little editing. However, I am learning from writing these MTW blogs that one has to prepared to ditch the ‘darlings’ – one’s favourite words and lines. The problem is, there are often many darlings and knowing which to keep and which to ditch is hard! People who read the work and comment however, can be wonderfully objective about them, not having the same degree of attachment.  Having ruthlessly weeded the darlings, I was directed to focus on clarity and continuity which was sometimes lacking. As a writer I have a tendency to make all kinds of subconscious connections in my mind, both within the story and in terms of wider context. But my readers often cannot always follow my internalised narrative.  In my story this meant that my readers could not understand who t...

  Each New Year I plan to write every day. Each January, I fail. I struggle to write much at all that month or in February. Is it just me? Or does it affect other writers as well? Research on the internet, suggests I’m not alone and the reasons given make sense to me. Here’s what’s usually going on: Our brains are tired after Christmas. Adrenaline keeps us going in December, but the Christmas holiday breaks that routine. Our brains are tired and we feel stodged up and lazy. January 1 st is the wrong time to make resolutions as we’re still in recovery mode and creativity hates being rushed out of convalescence. There’s also the problem with short days and low light levels. I always feel much more motivated to write on a summer evening than I do on a cold dark winter evening. I don’t have SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), but I still lack motivation. Apparently, many writers have a natural creative cycle and output peaks in certain seasons, while other seasons are for re...

‘You couldn’t make it up.’ That’s the trouble, the worry, and my concern. Try as I might, avoiding the news these days is well-nigh impossible. However, I can’t help thinking if I, or any other author for that matter, wrote a story about a man who preyed on weak and vulnerable girls, but who had so many rich and powerful (and male) friends who not only protected him but, when he finally got into trouble, were neither prosecuted nor investigated themselves. And if I also wrote that this man, on his release from prison, had female friends who would find girls for him – or ask him to visit when their own daughters were home – the manuscript would have been rejected out of hand as beyond the realms of credibility. And yet it looks like this has happened ‘in real life.’ Lower down the social scale, amongst those of us with less access to money and position, we wonder why women don’t feel safe. I have had a phone conversation with my son terminated – because he needed to make sure the line w...

 https://www.michaeloglesby.com Have any of you seen the Inside Out sequel? One of the parts that made me laugh the most was when the character Nostalgia kept appearing. Riley, as a 12–13-year-old, is far too young to have that character, but for me, as a 52-year-old, she can certainly appear — and she has, in an unexpected way. As I’ve often mentioned here, I’m a member of an online writers’ group called Alpha Writers , and our latest challenge was to write a villanelle — a poem with a repeating refrain. Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night by Dylan Thomas was the example we were given. So where does nostalgia come in? Well, that was the theme of the challenge. I struggled with this for a bit, but then I was asked a question recently: if I could go back in time, would I want to return to a place, an object, or a person? I initially decided on a place — my old boarding school. I went to boarding school from the age of eight, and I loved it. It was the perfect escape from my...

 Learning to sing my story - Christine Cleave I need a stroll around the garden to wake me up in the morning and a few days ago there was a treat in store - a small robin singing its heart out on the summit of a neighbouring tree. The musical twirls and flourishes stopped me dead in my tracks, as I wondered what the bird was saying - “This is my territory”?  Or was he broadcasting his search for a mate: “Come to my tree, lovely lady robins, and see what a very fine fellow I am!” Apparently, early humans sang before they learned to speak. I imagine a skin-clad man loudly carolling (but not verbalizing) the message, ‘I’m off to the forest to hunt deer.’ This might be accompanied by chest-pummelling and gestures in the correct direction. Maybe Stone Age man and the robin have something in common?   There are still tribes living in the Amazon basin that communicate in song. . . However, I must not let myself get diverted from the main purpose, which is to share my writing jou...