February 9, 2010

Satisfy your creative impulse

We bet you have a novel, screenplay or a great non-fiction book lurking within you. An itch that expresses itself in the irresistible desire to open a new file called “My Novel”. Or in the urge to take notes while eavesdropping in your favourite coffee-shop.

Of course, this creative impulse has economic possibilities. But more importantly, it signals the growing trend to focus on what is really important – your own talents and skills.

It’s no surprise that, in the current economic downturn, people are investing in themselves, rather than spending yet more money on yet more clutter.

For 2010 we at Allaboutwriting hope to provide you with an exciting array of courses, both long and short. Here are the courses and dates for the first quarter of 2010.

Our Writers’ Circle Course stimulates creativity and allows each writer to find their own individual voice. The course provides writers with a range of skills and techniques to translate their vision into publishable manuscripts.

The next Writers’ Circle begins on Monday, June 7 in Parkview, Johannesburg. The group will meet for two-and-a-half hours every Monday for 10 week. It is designed to serve would-be writers of fiction, non-fiction or even screenplays.

The skills cover everything from finding a voice to plotting a piece of writing from beginning to end. Click here for a detailed course description.  Cost: R 5500.

The Writers’ Circle Course is also available via correspondence. You will get the same personal attention from Richard and Jo-Anne … and you can do it in your favourite chair at any time of the day or night and at your own pace. Cost: R 5000

The Character Course – Join Jo-Anne Richards, Richard Beynon and psychologist Pierre Brouard on Saturday, February 27, to learn what makes great characters tick. They have joined forces to help screen-writers, novelists and television writers create characters that leap to life from page or screen. The workshop will be held in Parkview, Johannesburg from 9am to 5pm with lunch and refreshments included. This course, introduced to acclaim in 2009, will cost R1500.

Biography and Memoir – They say that there’s a book in each of us. More than likely this is your own story, but it could be you’d love to tell the story of someone else, living or dead, whose life seems to you an inspiration. Most of us, though, lack the skills to turn a fascinating life into a fascinating book. Join Jo-Anne Richards and Fred de Vries on this three day course and learn all you need to successfully tackle the writing of a biography or memoir. 6 and 7 March and 17 April.  Cost R4500.

Romance Writing – The simplest romance takes a thorough understanding of the genre, and a complex set of skills. In other words, there’s more to a Mills & Boon than meets the eye. This course is designed to show what rough magic lies behind the seamless romance of every good love story. Held over six Wednesday mornings in March and April, the course takes you through practical skills, with fun and challenging exercises. Cost – R3600

Join Richard Beynon and romance writer Alissa Baxter (author of three published romances) and learn what it takes to write a romance.

Allaboutwriting /continued otherwise known as the Maintenance Group is a monthly session for anyone who has previously done any of the Allaboutwriting courses. The sessions are held in the evening from 7 – 9 pm at a cost of R250.

Upcoming dates:
February – Wednesday 17
March – Wednesday 17
April – Wednesday 14

Cape Town Creative Writing Weekend – This weekend course is a writing experience with a difference. Taking you out of your comfort zones, the course will encourage creativity, while teaching the literary skills that will enable you to write with flair and dynamism. 10 and 11 April 2010. Cost: R 3 750 which includes lunches, teas, coffees and snacks.

For more information please call Trish on 0826524643 or email trishurquhart@gmail.com

Allaboutwriting is a partnership between Richard Beynon and Jo- Anne Richards who have both made their livings from writing for many years. We’re passionate about good writing, and have devised our courses to help communicate that passion – plus the skills that make it all much more than an academic exercise – to others with a similar calling.

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February 1, 2010

January writing exercise winner

Once again it was incredibly difficult to choose the winner of the monthly writing exercise. So congratulations to Zann who wins for showing, rather than telling, and her mix of guilt and longing and irritation.

We’d like to give special mention to Heather Hotaling, who handled this exercise with her usual delicacy and charm. Heather, who has been one of our most regular participants, has left South Africa for Colombia. (You could just have stopped coming, Heather. Really! You didn’t have to go to such extremes.)

We’ll miss you, Heather. We hope you’ll come back when you’ve got enough material for a couple of novels.

Shirley (38-42) has spent two weeks in Greece with her best friend Amanda. She fell wildly and inappropriately for a young diving instructor, Vasilli, who made her feel beautiful and for whom she experienced an intensity of emotion she hasn’t felt in years. They made frequent love. This is her first marital transgression. The scene you will write is set on her first evening back in SA. Her husband, Basil, has sent their teenage children to her sister for the night. He’s anticipating a warm welcome. He’s gone to a great deal of care to prepare dinner for them. Exploit the emotions inherent in their interaction as much as possible. ‘Show’ as much as possible, although you can use some inner life. This is a relationship-driven story: we don’t want to see too much plot development.

Red roses on the hallway table and wafts of green chicken curry with coriander meet Shirley as she pulls open the rain swollen front door.

“Is that you Shirl?”

The sink tap in the kitchen runs. The lid on the small rice pot with the orange handles clicks shut.
“Shirl, I’m in here.”

The Extractor fan hum calls her down the hall towards the open kitchen door.

“Shit the rice is burning.”

Still she hangs back, arranging her expression. She feels his slightly rough hands on the small of her back. His neck stubble scented with lime.

“Hey Shirl, just stirring the curry. What’s taking you?”

“Uh, bursting for a wee. See you in a sec.”

Safe behind the bathroom door. Forehead against the cool mirror. He’s pressing her from behind. One tanned arm across her soft belly, holding her arms down by her sides. The hotel mirror is cold against her hot, tingling breasts.

“Shirl, are you ok?”

Flush the loo. Check mascara. “Ja, good, coming.”

Shirley brushes her lips on his freshly shaved cheek. Noticing how their bodies don’t quite connect across his tight boep.

“Where the kids?”

“Sophie’s… Hold the door, love, just need to get the garlic bread out.”

Dinner for two?

“How was the trip – you look, uh different?”

Shirly carefully opens the foil on the steaming hot bread. Buttery garlic. Slowly licked off long brown fingers.

“Yeah, I’m feeling really relaxed. The weather was great. Probably look good with a bit of colour.”

“I’d forgotten how beautiful your eyes look when you’re tanned.”

“So what’s for dinner? Not sure I like you using my yoga candles.”

“Hey thought we could get to know each other again. Red or white?”

‘Why d’you always have to hold the bottle between your knees?”

“I dunno, been doing it like this since varsity. Remember our first date, when the cork broke.”

He slowly pulled the cork out, she felt liquid. The sun and Amanda taking off for the day on an island tour, left her free to keep eye contact. Long after she needed to. Vassilli lent forward, feeling her heat, poured her a glass. God, that first kiss. His lips were firm, wet, she wanted to bite down. Feel him wince like she knew she would later, when he pressed into her.

“Hey Baz, lets eat in front of TV. Haven’t watched Survivor in weeks. Feeling a bit tired from the flight. Really love to crash on the couch.”

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January 24, 2010

January Writing Exercise

This is the writing exercise from our January allaboutwriting/continued session. Try it yourself and stand the chance to win a R200 gift voucher from Boekehuis bookshop. Email your attempt to allaboutwriting@worldonline.co.za by midnight on Thursday January 28 2010.

Shirley (38-42) has spent two weeks in Greece with her best friend Amanda. She fell wildly and inappropriately for a young diving instructor, Vasilli, who made her feel beautiful and for whom she experienced an intensity of emotion she hasn’t felt in years. They made frequent love. This is her first marital transgression. The scene you will write is set on her first evening back in SA. Her husband, Basil, has sent their teenage children to her sister for the night. He’s anticipating a warm welcome. He’s gone to a great deal of care to prepare dinner for them. Exploit the emotions inherent in their interaction as much as possible. ‘Show’ as much as possible, although you can use some inner life. This is a relationship-driven story: we don’t want to see too much plot development.

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January 22, 2010

Can you write without suspense?

I recently heard an academic criticising a book for using “suspense” as a device. I found that odd, but perhaps that’s because my definition of suspense is wider than hers.

The book in question is a non-fiction work that borrows from the skills traditionally associated with fiction – as all good narrative journalism does nowadays.

It is written in scenes, with dialogue and developed characters. And the author has cut off his scenes at moments of conflict or tension – which make us long for the story to be picked up again. So perhaps the academic was referring to this type of literary device.

I think it’s one of the things that make the book work. She was criticising on ideological grounds, of course: whether it was valid or “right” to present true stories of crime and violence in a suspenseful way. But surely there’s a certain absurdity to any argument that suggests a book should be made less readable.

And to imply that any book can be written entirely without suspense is nonsense. When we think of suspense, we tend to think of thrillers and murders and detectives.

But anything that draws us forward is actually a form of suspense. It might not be an event or action. It might be a minute change of attitude, a loss of love, the gaining of peace of mind.

I recently read a beautiful novel by Marilynne Robinson, which consisted of an elderly man’s letter to his young son. The canvas was small and there were no grand, sweeping events in his life. But it certainly drew me forward.

Readers are drawn onward by caring for the characters. If they care deeply enough, they’ll be drawn into their world – no matter how small that world is. And on the contrary, I often find high action movies boring. I start nodding off during the car chase – precisely because I don’t care a stuff what happens to any of them.

Ian McEwan protests at what he calls the “dead hand of modernism.” He writes in such a way as to “incite a naked hunger in readers.” He says the key to this is withholding information.

I think that withholding is one of the great secrets – and a skill that’s really hard to learn. When you first write, the temptation is to do the opposite. You want to spew everything out at once.

The reason withholding works is that it creates a tension or an imbalance. We keep reading because we want to see the imbalance righted and the tension broken.

In the end, it’s probably all to do with conflict and tension. If there’s no conflict, there’s no story – and certainly no suspense. This conflict can be with the environment – a plane crash in the Andes …

It can be person against person – or it can be inner conflict. I believe there’s always inner conflict, no matter what other conflicts exist. And these are often the most interesting.

These can be as big or as small as you like, but it has to be there. And suspense is a must, like it or not. If you don’t draw your reader forward, there’s little point in finishing the book – they certainly won’t.

Jo-Anne Richards muses on the challenges and excitement of a writer’s life.

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December 17, 2009

Allaboutwriting Course Dates

For 2010 we hope to provide you with a new and exciting array of retreats and courses, both long and short, to attract those of you who haven’t yet joined one of our groups, and tempt the rest of you back into the fold. We enjoy having you. Here are the courses and dates for the first quarter of 2010.

For those of you who have done one of our courses, the Allaboutwriting/continued dates are 20 January, 17 February, 17 March and 14 April. All are Wednesdays at the usual time of 7 – 9pm and the usual cost of R250.

Our first Writers’ Circle Course for 2010 will start on Monday 18 January. Sessions will be held every Monday from 7 – 9.30pm for ten weeks. Cost R5500 or take advantage of our early bird special of R5000 if you book and pay before 31 December.

Character Course – Join Jo-Anne Richards, Richard Beynon and psychologist Pierre Brouard on Saturday, February 27, to learn what makes great characters tick. They have joined forces to help screen-writers, novelists and television writers create characters that leap to life from page or screen. The workshop will be held in Parkview, Johannesburg from 9am to 5pm with lunch and refreshments included. This course, introduced to acclaim in 2009, will cost R1500.

We have two new courses for 2010. The first one is a three-day course on Memoir and Biography which will be run by Jo-Anne Richards and Fred de Vries. The dates are Saturday 6 and Sunday 7 March with the final day being on Saturday 17 April. The cost of the course is R4500. Or R4100 with an Early Bird discount of 10%, if you register and pay by 31 January, 2010.

Richard and romance writer Alissa Baxter (author of three published romances) will be running a Romance Writing Course to be held over 6 Wednesday mornings – 3, 10, 17, 24 March and 14 and 21 April. This course will cost R3600.

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December 16, 2009

Winner of December Boekehuis Gift Voucher

All the exercises this month were well executed, some startling in their intensity. Difficult to select the winner, but here it is: Helen’s was short, punchy, complex and utterly convincing.

Write a passage of physical action(a dance, someone is running to catch a plane, there is a fight or someone is trying to escape capture.) In order to make the action crystal clear, describe what happens as if you were filming it using only one camera that is fixed in a single place. This will help organise the action so it is easy for a reader to visualise.

Helen Webster’s Entry

The sun set inexorably in the west. Lucas ran up the rock strewn hill with long easy strides. His blood filled exhalations splattered the earth. Pumping knees and arms worked blistered feet.

Pieterse came after him, his strides not long, nor easy but he had the advantage of a gun. Pausing, he took aim. The squeeze of the trigger whisper soft, the trajectory of the bullet true. Lucas fell to the ground, orange dust rose up gently, softly, obscuring Lucas’s body like a veil. Pieterse hunkered down, patient as a dog out hunting hares.

Lucas crawled the last few metres to the crest. His eyes fixed on a point unseen, his palms torn open, his nails ripped beyond the quick, his were the actions of an automaton. Bits of dislodged shale betrayed his whereabouts but still Pieterse did not move. He waited below, so still, a fly landed on his arm, drunk with the prospect of perspiration.

Lucas gritted his teeth, stained with blood and dust. He found the crest. Sinking face down, a shuddering sigh expanded his lungs for the last time.

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December 2, 2009

December Writing Exercise

This is the exercise from our December allaboutwriting/continued session. Try it yourself and stand the chance to win a R200 gift voucher from Boekehuis bookshop. Email your attempt to allaboutwriting@worldonline.co.za by 6pm on Sunday 6 December.

Write a passage of physical action(a dance, someone is running to catch a plane, there is a fight or someone is trying to escape capture.) In order to make the action crystal clear, describe what happens as if you were filming it using only one camera that is fixed in a single place. This will help organise the action so it is easy for a reader to visualise.

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December 1, 2009

A Conversation with Writers, David Krut Bookstore, Arts on Main

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November 12, 2009

Winner of November Boekehuis Voucher

Well done to Ronnie Whitaker winner of the November Boekehuis Gift Voucher. Read the exercise and Ronnie’s response below.

Write a scene of a fight or an argument or a disagreement (as violent or as subtle as you like), based on a remembered altercation between you and another — it might have been a partner, a friend, a parent, a teacher, a boss or a colleague. Write this in the first person — or third person attached. Take fifteen minutes and no more.

Then, in another fifteen minutes, write the same scene again from the point of view of the other person.

Try not to favour either person involved.

The Fight by Ronnie Whitaker

Lucy’s Perspective

“We have to go now. I want to miss the traffic” said Sophie.

“But Bill’s just ordered French champagne!”

“Tough. There’s enough people around to drink it. We have to go.”

“Shit” thought Lucy. “She’s in one of her moods. I knew this was a bad move.”
Sibling rivalry was still there, even in middle age.

“I will bring her home” said Bill. “We ordered French champagne to celebrate her triumph – as well as the birth of my first grand child this morning in the USA! You can’t deny a new grand father that pleasure?”

Sophie glared at him for what seemed an eternity.

“Fine!” She turned to Lucy. “See you later.”

Lucy was on a high. Sure, it was a phallic symbol, but as long as she was the resident bimbo with her hair blowing back at 160k on the highway, “You make me think of dancing” blaring out of the mega Bose sound system, phallic symbols were ok.

Sophie was rustling through packets of supermarket goods when Lucy burst into the apartment.

“I wish you’d stayed! We had such fun. I feel 26 again. Bill even had his hand on my knee driving here. Some larny sports car. God! I can’t believe I didn’t even notice what it was. Must be a Z4 … that’s what they buy in their 50’s isn’t it?”

She had prattled on for a good five minutes before she realized that Sophie was just standing there, glaring, murderous actually.

“Can’t you shut up for one minute! I’m listening to the market report. I have to know what’s going on in the financial world in my job. Not that you would understand that.”

“Here we go” thought Lucy. “She simply had to toss the career success in my face, today of all days.”

“Sorry. Sorry. I’m just on such a high .. and totally self absorbed.”

Lucy walked through to the guest suite, Godzilla following her, breathing fire. She could feel the heat on her back, burning.

“And – how dare you bring Jane up to my flat. And how dare you tell people at the table where I work”

“What are you talking about? I never mentioned you at the table. I was too busy talking about myself. And you know I had to bring Jane up so I could give her the extra copy. What else could I do? And what the hell’s the problem with that?”

“I’m just sick of you.”

“Do you want me to move to a B and B for the rest of my stay then?”

“That’s a bloody good idea. You can leave at 6.30 when I leave for work. Until then, stay out of my sight.”

She slammed the door.

“No supper then, I presume” muttered Lucy.

Sophie’s Perspective

Sophie had taken a day’s unpaid leave to attend the book launch. The day started with a flat tyre!

Lucy was standing there, calling a taxi service, instead of helping change the tyre. She had always been so fucking useless.

Sophie made her cancel and sent the taxi driver packing, as she had changed the tyre by the time he arrived. Sometimes one just had to make a point. If Lucy had been a little less spendthrift, she might have had more to her name at this stage of life.

There must’ve been 300 people at the luncheon.

“I wish I could be more sociable” thought Sophie. “But these pretentious obnoxious people just make me uncomfortable.”

Lucy met up with an ex boss in the crowd and immediately forgot about everybody at the head table. Sophie was left to make small talk with women who had never worked a day in their lives, despite being draped in Versace and Prada and dripping in rubies and diamonds. Thank God she was seated next to the cartoonist Eidin. Sophie enjoyed her Irish humour. and at least she wasn’t a stranger.

Eidin’s introduction was wonderful – teasing but warm. She was obviously very fond of Lucy, who, by the way, had disappeared!

When Jane introduced the speaker, Lucy flounced in, dressed in the ridiculous costume. The crowd loved it.

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November 12, 2009

Writers’ Circle Course Early Bird Special

Our first Writers’ Circle Course for 2010 starts on 18 January. The course is designed for writers who have a specific project in mind as well as for those who simply want the chance to exercise their creative skills.

The Writers’ Circle Course runs participants through a range of practical techniques, reinforcing each with exercises which are both fun and challenging. Sessions are held in Parkview, Johannesburg every Monday evening from 7.00-9.30pm. Cost: R5500 for 10 sessions. Take advantage of our early bird special of R5000 by booking and paying in full by 31 December 2009.

Course Outline
• Freeing you up/finding your voice
• Brainstorming and story-boarding
• What is the story?
• Point of view
• Building characters, be they real or fictional
• Beginnings: where do you start to tell your story?
• Scenes: telling stories in a series of scenes
• Middles and ends
• Suspense: setups and payoffs
• Detail and description
• Avoiding exposition: show, don’t tell
• Dialogue and wrap-up

Please click here for a more detailed course description.

For more information please contact Trish on 0826524643 or email allaboutwriting@worldonline.co.za

Read testimonials from past participants and information about the facilitators.

Allaboutwriting is a partnership between Richard Beynon and Jo-Anne Richards who have both made their livings from writing for many years. We’re passionate about good writing, and have devised our courses to help communicate that passion – plus the skills that make it all much more than an academic exercise – to others with a similar calling.

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