Archives

There’s a distinction that writers need to make before they become great. It was a point I made in a university course I taught recently – and I think it came as something of a revelation. But [...]

The dough of a particular variety of wholewheat bread is almost liquid. It slips between your fingers, it makes unexpected lunges for the edge of your working surface, it resists any attempt to [...]

Fights, or action sequences, which involve many peripheral characters, are difficult to write well. We have a tendency to rush them. We give the results of the clash, rather than carrying us [...]

Explore the mysteries and the craft of creating story in that most charming of Cotswold market towns, Stow-on-the-Wold. Join a group of like-minded souls for the weekend of 7 to 9 June. Far from [...]

Writers are God, we rather fatuously proclaim. We can do anything – bring characters to life, destroy them at will, have Fate take a hand in the affairs of men. All this is no doubt true – but [...]

Enjoy a bit of literary fun with All About Writing and Slow Life at our creative writing workshop at Casa Labia in Muizenberg. Be inspired by the cry of gulls as you release your creativity, [...]

Every now and again, a character has a realisation which changes everything. It hits him between the eyes and forces him to view things in a completely new light. Since our readers have been [...]

What draws us to write about our travels? What is it about travel writing that is so beguiling? We, at All About Writing, receive almost daily queries from members of our community who hope to [...]

George Sanders, winner of the Man Booker in 2017 for his Lincoln in the Bardo, and author of several books of astonishing short stories, makes an important point about detail in fiction in an [...]

One of our mentoring participants sent me this quote recently and it resonated: “Sit down and put down everything that comes into your head and then you’re a writer. But an author is [...]

Writing has rules, yes? Rules of punctuation. Rules of grammar. Rules regarding cause before effect (the first should come before the second). Rules regarding point of view. Rules regarding [...]