Post Greenbelt

Thanks again to everyone who came to the talk at Greenbelt on Monday. I so enjoyed sharing some work and some ideas about stories.

If you asked me for more chapbooks, I will get some made and will post on the blog when they are ready to send out.

For the person who asked about how to make chapbooks, I will endeavor to make a post about those soon too.

This is a quote I used in my talk from Michael Mayne's book This Sunrise of Wonder: 

‘It may seem as if poetry, the creative arts and the world of the imagination, are useless in the face of so much that is evil and destructive; as Seamus Heaney has said, ‘no lyric has ever stopped a tank’. No; but there are lyrics [or short stories], paintings, buildings, music, that have stopped a person dead in their tracks, amazed at the work of the human mind and hand and eye; seeing beauty, experiencing momentary wonder that they had never noticed, and enlarging their understanding of what it means to be a person.’

Below is the start of a list of favourite short stories that I promised you:

‘The home of the famous poet’ by Muriel Spark 

‘A whisper in the dark,’ by Louisa May Alcott 

‘A pair of silk stockings,’ by Kate Chopin 

‘The Kiss,’ ‘Rothschild’s Violin’ and 'The Student,' by Anton Chekhov

‘The Tell-Tale Heart,’ and ‘The fall of the house of Usher,’ by Edgar Allen Poe

‘The Sculptor’s Funeral,’ ‘The Garden Lodge’ and  ‘Neighbour Rosicky,’ by Willa Cather

‘That Colour,’ from Jon McGregor’s new collection 

'The Offshore Pirate,' 'Bernice Bobs her Hair,' and 'A Diamond as Big as the Ritz,' by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

'Pale Horse, Pale Rider,' by Katherine Anne Porter.

The beginning of the end...

I am in the final stage of chapbook three, Map. I have faffed around with pens, paper and pictures for months, and the story has changed a little. Tonight I trimmed, edited and polished each page and dreamed about it all being finished. Tomorrow I will try to work out pagination (difficult for someone who struggles not only with left and right, but also with numbers) and complete the cover. I have finished working for tonight, but am not ready to sleep, so here I am.

I'm not very confident about this third chap: perhaps it's because it's the third, or perhaps because my old fear is returning that all my stories are the same. But I do think it's an important story, and I am pleased with the pictures. I commissioned my young cousin, Millie, to do two of the illustrations for me. She sent through exactly what I wanted, and those pictures alone are worth reading the book for. She is seven and a quiet genius.

The completion of Map brings my chapbook project to an end, and although I've learnt a lot, I am pleased to be finishing. Making books is really hard work, but it is rewarding. When I see the three complete books sitting side by side, I will be happy indeed. And then, after I've sold one or two (hopefully), I'll start the next thing....

Meet my new typewriter, isn't it lovely?

Deborah Fielding's Adventure with Scientists!

I hoped I wouldn't neglect my blog, but I also hoped I would get other opportunities to write alongside making my chapbooks... So I hope you'll understand. 

Over the last couple of months I have been given two opportunities to write stories for other people. First, I will write about my Adventure with Scientists, and then I'll tell you about my commission for .Cent Magazine. 

I heard about Science Writes to Life through my brother-in-law, Dr. Ryan Pink - the Health & Life Sciences and Creative Writing departments at Oxford Brookes said 'the more the merrier,' so on the 30th April I found myself meeting with developmental psychologist Dr. Louise Bunce in Oxford. 

Louise told me a bit about her research into when children learn to distinguish between 'real' and 'pretend.' If you'd like to learn more, look at Louise's Linkdn page here. We talked not only about her work, but about mine too and the creative process. We both went away full of ideas and I came up with this story inspired by her work. 

On the 11th May, we met again at the Pagasus Theatre in Oxford to present the work that our collaboration had produced. Louise and I were joined by other scientists from the Health and Life Sciences Department, and other writers, notably Fiona Sampson. It was an astonishing evening and so so interesting - everything was good. There's a local review here.

Several weeks earlier, I was asked to write a 300 word short story on the theme of 'Confection' for .Cent Magazine. I was thrilled to be asked - the story (and illustration) are here in the latest issue!

I'm starting to think that commissions are fun - there's nothing like a challenge!

______

In other news, my 7 year old cousin, Millie, is helping me with illustrations for Chap 3 - I am hoping to get it done in the next couple of weeks!

More illustrations..

I'm away from home at the moment but brought with me a list of illustrations. These are for chapbook three : Map.

Here are the first two:

A crisis of confidence

I have these regularly and they are part of being a person who makes things. Sometimes the things you make turn out to be rubbish, sometimes you don't make them because you think they might be rubbish and sometimes - thank goodness - the things you make aren't rubbish. 

When people ask what you do for a living, and ask if you make any money out of it - that's when confidence starts to crack and tumble to the floor. And when you hear about other peoples' success or publication - it shouldn't be worrying, but it is. Mortgages - they make me worry. A future in writing -don't be ridiculous!


But daft as it sounds - and it does sound daft to me - I have to do it. I have to make things - it's what I do. And although I'd love to make money from writing one day, I'd love to get 'spotted,' I'm not in a hurry and perhaps I'm not good enough yet.


Still, slow and steady wins the race, doesn't she? I am very slow - not sure about steady - but 50% isn't bad. And what race am I trying to win, anyway? I'm not sure.

First draft - hope it's not rubbish!

I have been poorly this week, but laryngitis doesn't stop you writing, just talking, so I have finally plucked up the courage to create a first draft of my third chapbook, Map. I'm a bit worried it's going to be rubbish, and it might be...but you can be the judge of that (when I finish it).

1st illustration from Map

Pulling Teeth - a guest post from Elise Newman

Thanks, Debbie, for making space on your lovely blog for the ridiculous musings of this short Canadian would-be playwright, director, and vagabond.

I have a hard time saying “I’m a writer” when someone asks the dreaded “And what do you do?” question. It never comes out without a bit of waffling and mumbled “sort of” and “one day” and “I try to be...”

It might come off as obnoxious self-deprecation, but it’s seriously difficult to claim “I’m a writer” when most of my day is full of non-writing. When Debbie suggested we swap blog posts, she thought I could write something about my process. At the moment, my process isn’t really working out, seeing as I’m spending my days finding excuses not to write.

I love having written. The actual writing of it is sometimes like pulling teeth.

When I do decide to pull teeth, my writing process goes something like this:

1) An image, sentence, or character gets lodged in my imagination.

2) It grows, swims around, and hatches in my head.

3) I sit down and write random thoughts, scenes, dialogue, and images all the while trying not to think too much. This step rarely happens without a deadline.

4) I try not to censor myself as I write. This is my biggest challenge.

5) I eat a lot of chocolate, drink a lot of coffee, and stay in my pyjamas as much as possible.

6) I write nonsense by hand, rewrite it as I type it on the computer, doodle, read it out loud, print it, mark it up, rewrite it, get depressed because it’s terrible, organise my pencils, sleep, read it again, find something ok in it, rewrite it, send it to a friend, get an ego boost from their comments and a reality check from their criticism. Rewrite it.

7) Realise it’s not perfect, but save the document with a final-seeming title anyway.

8) The process usually takes a long long time. Years, even, if you count all that percolating of ideas (steps one and two).

These days, I’m letting things block my process at step 3. I have ideas. I have images and characters and situations in my head. I’m just too lazy (or afraid) to sit down and write. But I’ll get right down to it, now that I’ve admitted it publicly.

But I do have very valid excuses why I just don’t have time to write at the moment:

-I have to read this book/blog/cereal box first- it’s research! (Sometimes it’s time to put the research away and write what you think you know. And fix the facts later.) -I don’t have a good place to write- my desk is too messy (there are several adorable coffee shops around as well as a kitchen table, and the library).

-I need to clean my desk, my room, the bathroom, and reorganize my spice rack before I can even think about writing (if you can live in the mess, you should be able to write in the mess)

-I should finish this thing that actually pays me money before I spend time on writing (there will always be something that needs to be done)

-Let me just Google writing contests, grants, and residencies to get motivated

-Parks and Recreation is on. 

Me, actually writing.

If you'd like to peruse Elise's blog, Around the world in 80 plays, please do - it's funny, honest and takes you to places you've never been!