 |
||
| Sutton House – Linenfold Parlour
Hello and welcome!
I am delighted to be taking part in The Great Blog Tour this week. Last week was Jane Moss, here’s the link to her post:
Jane is a fellow Lapidus member and kindly invited me on board. We are blogging about our writing processes.
At the moment I am focusing on poetry – further inspired by NaPoWriMo (National Poetry Writing Month). I dedicated Saturday afternoons to go to an inspiring venue around London, ideally a place that I had a connection with. The first week I edited a poem at The William Morris Gallery in Walthamstow and the next two weeks, I sat in different rooms in Sutton House – the stunning National Trust Tudor House where I used to work and still return to for my Creative Writes Workshops. Last week, I sat in The Linenfold Parlour and wrote a poem inspired by the surroundings. It isn’t quite ready to share yet but watch this space!
I start with a warm up writing topic, sometimes it is as simple as ‘I’m Thinking Of…’ or ‘I see…’ In the case of Sutton House, I wanted to absorb my surroundings, to allow the stories of the house to feed into my work. I timed myself ten minutes for each free flow and then started to shape a poem. I am also currently using the writing prompts offered by Mslexia Magazine in their Little Ms April newsletter, they are really inspiring; https://www.mslexia.co.uk/index.php For me, free flow is the foundation for my writing and it really never fails. I set my clock, move my pen across the page and the words unravel. In my experience, thinking too much can freeze the process and make it painful! I have also been privileged enough to see how effective this process is for other writers during the workshops.
Next week, I am delighted to be passing on The Blog Tour baton to Sarah Shotts over in the USA and Alex Illsley here in London. I met Sarah when she was a volunteer at Sutton House, providing invaluable support for the Arts Projects I was managing. Alex attends Creative Writes workshops and it is wonderful to have her as part of the groups:
Sarah Shotts lives in Arkansas USA. She is a multimedia storyteller and tells stories with films, words & photography. She has a personal blog http://blog.sarahshotts.com and also blogs for publishing company Quirk Books. She is working on several fiction novels in the sci-fi and fantasy genres.
Alex Illsley lives in North West London and has been writing since she was young but has only started sharing her work in the past year or so. She is particularly fond of poetry, although she is working on prose too and would love to publish a novel one day: https://www.facebook.com/pages/My-Random-Writings/1403693233214622?ref=stream Sarah and Alex’s Blog Tour posts will be online from next Monday. More dates for your diary: Creative Writes monthly Themed Workshops continue on Wednesday 30 April with Spin A Story, 7.30-9.30pm. Creative Writes new Thursday evening workshops begin on 1 May for four weeks 7.30-9.30pm. Booking and info here: https://www.creativewrites.co.uk/p/bookings-workshop-info-how-to-book.html All Spring Workshops will be at the lovely North Bank, Muswell Hill, N10. |
.jpg)
.jpg) |
| Old meets new, view from Sutton House cafe |
I hope you have enjoyed reading. Bye for now!
Nichola
Nichola