How are you doing? Apparently we’re now all feasting on The Repair Shop and reruns of The Vicar of Dibley. The skies are bluer and quieter than ever, all the better to hear birdsong. Stars are brighter, if you have access to outdoor space at night time. I realise these are terrible times for soRead more ⟶
Category: Writing
Making, moving, cleaning, reading, studying, growing … life while social distancing
Funny how quickly our vocabulary grows around novel situations. A few weeks ago I’m not sure I was familiar with the terms social distancing, self-isolation or elbow bump. Now – well, you know. With so many projects and events cancelled in the last few days, and many more to come, I’m reminded how crucial itRead more ⟶
A chilled start to the year
January 15th and I’m just getting round to my first post of the year, something that would have concerned me a bit in the past but for the new decade I’m surprisingly chilled. A new decade. Hmmm. Is it me, or has it passed rather under the radar this year? I think I remember theRead more ⟶
Ah! The business of poetry blogging
Oh no! It’s been a few weeks since my last post, and yet Matthew Stewart has still generously kept me on his list of ‘Best UK Poetry Blogs of 2019’. Matthew observes that 2019 was ‘far from being a vintage year’ for blogging, and his suggestions of why this might be are interesting: keeping a blogRead more ⟶
And from this cluttered desk
I admit it – I’m very nosy about other people’s workspaces. Writers and artists especially. So I loved Josephine Corcoran’s recent post about her ‘cluttered desk’ – although I thought it looked pretty good actually. My first instinct was of course to compare it to mine, so I reached for the camera – but beforeRead more ⟶
Back to school, current reading & looking forward
Back. After twelve days or so away I’m feeling positively autumnal and a bit ‘back to school’ (garden looking blousy, woollies coming out the wardrobe, wondering when Masterchef starts, etc). I haven’t got back into any new writing but that will come. Sometimes I get the feeling I’m waiting – for inspiration maybe – forRead more ⟶
Working from (a temporary) home
I’m currently working each morning from a little B&B room in a farmhouse in Pembrokeshire, while Nick is here playing the organ for St David’s Cathedral. Apart from occasionally getting up in the night and bashing into furniture it’s all very pleasant. A cockerel and a swarm of hens outside. Peaceful countryside views. We’ve hadRead more ⟶
A few thoughts from Virginia Woolf on praise and fame
Virginia Woolf’s A Writer’s Diary is proving a rich source of inspiration. On the subject of a writer’s insecurity, it’s refreshing to find the same things bothered her that do us all – is my writing any good, what will people make of it, how come so-and-so got more coverage/attention than me, and so on.Read more ⟶
Look what I found! Virginia Woolf’s ‘A Writer’s Diary’
… Fourth Impression (1965) with a foreword by Leonard Woolf. Hogarth Press! Original dust jacket bearing Vanessa Bell’s design! I found it at Much Ado Books in Alfriston, well worth a visit if you’re ever in the area. It’s housed in a range of quirky buildings set back off the road in its own frontRead more ⟶
On redrafting old material, and a welcome acceptance
During my mini-retreat in Cork I dug out a number of old as-yet-unfinished or unpublished poems to see what I could breathe new life into. Re-use & recycle! Nothing’s wasted! Or is it? Sometimes when I get out an old poem I find I’ve put enough distance between it and me, and now I’m ableRead more ⟶