Monthly Archives: January, 2012
Writing Seeds Round-up
Every weekday on twitter (@sarahsalway), I put up what I’ve been calling ‘writing seeds’ – little lines or random snippets that I use myself to exercise my writing muscles before I start my ‘proper writing’. Here are some from the last week… * His career progressed mostly without him * How to recognise a real [...]
Happy Lunar New Year….
Lovely to celebrate on Monday in London’s Chinatown at a delicious meal with our Thai friend, Irene. So in honour of the Year of the Dragon, a quote from Cornelia Funke to remind us of the joy of being able to create our own worlds in fiction… I always wanted to ride a dragon myself, [...]
Salway’s 100 Question Character Interview…
One of my favourite creative writing exercises is to have students create a character on the paper through a series of questions, and then get them – one by one – to pretend to be their character and submit to being interviewed by the rest of the group. It’s amazing what startling storylines can come [...]
Five Sentences with… Dan Purdue
To be honest, Dan Purdue’s blog profile doesn’t give away that much about him: My name’s Dan. I write fiction – mainly short stories, but with a novel approaching completion. Well, sort of. I’m thirty-something, I live in Worcestershire, I don’t have a cat. But it was a pleasure to meet him recently on an [...]
So what’s new….
This paragraph from the excellent Raymond Carver, A Writer’s Life feels like something lifted from any piece being written today about the publishing industry. Apart from the last line. And more’s the pity. In the 1970s, mainstream publishers began to reflect the changes that had washed across the American landscape in the 1960s. The business [...]
The Arvon magic….
Having just come back from a week at the Hurst, I’ve been wondering what makes Arvon – both teaching and writing – work. I think it’s something to do with this quote, which I read out there: ‘To write means to live thoughtfully. To respect your inner life. To engage with the world. Why shouldn’t [...]
Have you a poem lurking….?
There’s still time to enter the Kent & Sussex Open Poetry Competition, with over £1500 of prizes. The deadline may be extended a week, and we’d be very grateful for your support now. This is a difficult time for all arts organisations, and to be honest, competitions such as these are what are keeping many [...]
A sneak preview of my new cover….
Like it? The poetry collection will be out properly at the beginning of March – details of the party to come! But I know that some lovely people have pre-ordered it here and although I don’t know who you are unless you’ve contacted me direct for your ‘in-limbo’ postcard, thank you thank you thank you…! [...]
