Let’s fantasise for a moment. You’ve finished your book, you’ve secured an agent (you only had to write thirty-seven emails to do so), and they’ve managed to place your manuscript […]
Something has shifted this year. We’re (many of us through necessity) spending less. We’re more aware of what’s important. That means focusing on the people we hold dear and on […]
“Meaning” is the thing that lies behind, or beneath, or beyond. The sighs of a lover are what we note. But the meaning of those sighs is what we interpret. […]
Those who are “given the job of telling stories,” according to Italian novelist Elena Ferrante, “should construct fictions that help seek the truth of the human condition”. I love her […]
Elmore Leonard famously said: Never start with the weather. “But does this mean I never, ever mention the weather at the beginning of my book?” one of our participants asked […]
Let’s think about a series of very tiny – but, some say, enormously significant – decisions that every writer has to take when beginning a story, and that is, what […]
This is a counter-intuitive piece of writing advice. After all, you want to get your writing out there, I know that. You do want to be read, even if only […]
We all know the old writing truism: never tell when you can show. But I’ve recently come to realise that many people misunderstand what it means to “show”. I’ve come […]
I’ve always been fascinated by the relationship that springs into being whenever a reader picks up a book, opens it and begins the journey to which it is an invitation. […]
Today, 9 August, marks Women’s Day in South Africa, where half of our team is based and where (in normal times) many of our courses and workshops take place. It’s […]
Here’s a very short reflection on an absolutely essential attitude to writing. It can be encapsulated in a single, short dictum: The only question to worry about in your writing […]
When I taught young journalists, I told them to stop halfway through their story and ask themselves: Am I bored? Last week I suggested a couple of questions you could […]