Author: Pen
-
Psychic space and an unusual recipe for mitigating a cold
When I was chosen to be a blogger in residence at the ACT Writers Centre I planned to supplement those once a month blogs with more frequent postings on this personal blog. But I’m going to have surgery soon (nothing serious) and I’ve been psyching myself up for that and doing all the things I…
-
Food Blogging- more than just a love of food
https://actwritersblog.com/2016/08/01/food-blogging-more-than-a-love-of-food/
-
A divided world – depicting the lives of refugees
‘Refugees live in a divided world, between countries in which they cannot live and countries which they may not enter.’ Elie Wiesel, Romanian-born Holocaust survivor, writer and Nobel Peace Prize winner, said this. He believes that it is the moral responsibility of all people to fight hatred, racism and genocide. After World War II…
-
Diving into the River
My first blog as a Blogger in Residence at the ACT Writers Centre is up on the CAPITAL LETTERS site. It is on screenwriting. Future posts will be on writing and refugees, prisoners’ writing, the health of writers (all that sitting, for one detrimental thing!), food blogging, writers dreaming … all topics I’m interested in…
-
Wear books like hats upon your crazy head…
‘You must write every single day of your life. You must read every single day of your life. You must lurk in libraries and climb the stacks like ladders to sniff books like perfumes and wear books like hats upon your crazy head. I wish you a wrestling match with your Creative Muse that will…
-
Patricia Highsmith’s handbag
Patricia Highsmith (1921-1995), prolific author of crime novels plus the novel Carol, recently made into a film directed by Todd Haynes, was a prolific drinker and smoker as well. She smoked a packet of Gaulloises a day. Famously not very good with people, Highsmith had an intense connection with animals. She loved cats. Snails made…
-
A Sense of Style
Style is ‘the mirror of an artist’s sensibility’. That was what Truman Capote thought. I think style is what comes naturally because it’s an expression of who you are, a projection of your personality. Edith Wharton wrote about the ‘unassailable serenity’ of being at home in ourselves, just as the French talk about being ‘happy…
-
Boy, Lost – a compelling memoir
Boy, Lost (University of Queensland Press, 2013) is a fascinating and compelling memoir by Kristina Olsson and her luminous prose elevates it to an even higher level. This book feels transcendent with a mother’s love. The author gains profound insight on her journey to trace the steps of her mother and of her lost brother,…
-
Coining words – from assassination to jobstopper
Shakespeare introduced 1,700 words and many phrases we still use today. He coined assassination, for instance, from the 8th century Arabic assassin. Even-handed, far-off, hot-blooded, schooldays, well-respected, are Shakespeare’s too, as are useful, moonbeams, subcontinent. [Without him we wouldn’t have the phrases] laughing yourself into stitches, setting your teeth on edge, not sleeping a wink,…
-
Putting the world into words – Tim Parks and why we write
I’ve been fond of English writer Tim Parks since he cheerfully admitted to ABC Radio interviewer Margaret Throsby that he had had ‘enough rejection slips for his novels to paper Buckingham Palace with!’ Parks wrote seven novels over six years before one was accepted for publication. Rejected by twenty publishers, Parks tells us in Where…