writer
This week I took Alice Oswald's book Weeds and Wild Flowers in to St Gregory's Catholic College, Bath, where I'm working as Writer in Residence. I was prompted to do this by Sarah Westcott's gorgeous poem about snowdrops Fair Maids of February which was a winner in this year's Cafe Writers Competition judged by Liz… Continue reading Writing poems about flowers #writerinschool
I brought in some crime flash fiction to St Gregory's School where I work one day a week as writer in residence and the students loved reading, talking about, and writing their own very short crime stories. These were Year 8 and Year 9 students, aged 12 - 14, with a variety of different literacy… Continue reading Very short crime stories: #writerinschool
Dashing off a quick post to try to keep to my weekly blog plan as part of the Poet Bloggers 2018 Revival Tour. I'm knee-deep in old notebooks this week, as I flounder inside the messy and muddy quagmire that is my poetry manuscript. I've spent the past two days holed-up inside my house, as… Continue reading Keeping a poetry reading journal
As I mentioned before, I liked the collage feel of both Anthony Wilson's notebook posts and Julie Mellor's post about Cubomania, in which Julie cut up blocks of text and placed them together in a random way to create new poems. With this in mind, I started a new term at St Gregory's Catholic College, Bath,… Continue reading Writing poetry with secondary school students: using cut ups #writerinschool
I'm a pretty regular blogger but I have let things slip a bit recently, mostly because I've been busy doing other kinds of writing. In a bid to up my game, I've been kindly added to this list of poet bloggers who are trying to blog weekly in 2018. You can also add yourself to… Continue reading Poet Bloggers 2018 Revival Tour
I've enjoyed these tweets from different writers who've shared their stories of not being straight out of the cradle when their writing received recognition. Here are a few of them: https://twitter.com/KitdeWaal/status/939278943332503552 https://twitter.com/VanessaGebbie/status/939130266538467328 https://twitter.com/pascalepoet/status/939677522693824512 The writer Joanna Walsh (@badaude on Twitter) has written this article on The Guardian books blog, arguing that "all awards for young… Continue reading My started late, stop-start writing “career”
I've been reading and selecting poems for And Other Poems for over five years now and while I'm not saying that there is only one way to send out a submission, I am extremely grateful to poets who send a submission in a certain way. Obviously, different places have different guidelines - which should be… Continue reading Submitting poems to online places
I'm really enjoying being Writer in Residence at St Gregory's Catholic College, Bath. As well as writing with students during lesson time, I also run a Creative Writing Club at Break and Lunchtime, one day a week. When we're writing poetry, I usually take in lots of photocopies of poems but today I took in… Continue reading Reading and writing Christmas-themed poems with Year 7s: #writerinschool
I'm coming to the end of my first term as Writer in Residence at St Gregory's Catholic College, Bath. As you know, I've been using this blog as a place to document my work there. Previous posts include Beginning to Write Poetry With Secondary School Students, Reading and Writing Poems about Where I'm From, National Poetry… Continue reading Thinking about sound and other senses. #writerinschool
As I've mentioned before, I'm using this blog as a place to keep a record of my residency at St Gregory's Catholic College, Bath, a non-selective comprehensive school for young people aged 11 - 18. I go into school one day a week, run a creative club (open to any student) during break and at… Continue reading Reading and writing poems about ‘Where I’m From’. #writerinschool
Josephine Corcoran 