'First Tuesday' 3rd January 2pm to 4pm

Trees

 Presented by

Anne Norman

Chesterfield Library

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up

Chris Fewtrell - New Book

Terminal One by Christopher Fewtrell

Gary is bedridden in an unknown health facility which he calls The Institution. He doesn’t know what’s wrong with him but he knows he’s in big trouble. With plenty of time on his hands, he pieces together, as accurately as he can, the key points in his life, including his relationships. There was one woman who was the love of his life but he has no idea what happened to her.

This intriguing story includes rugby and racism mixed with mobility scooter racing and a career in orthopaedic surgery.

What has happened to Gary? Will he recover? Will he ever find out what happened to special woman?

A human mystery which includes some strange twists…

Paperback £6; Kindle eBook £1. 

 Link for Amazon here:Terminal One at Amazon

FIRST TUESDAY GROUP MEETINGS JANUARY - JULY 2017

Chesterfield Library

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up

.

DATE	WORKSHOP LEADER	THEME
Jan. 3rd	Anne Norman	Trees
Feb. 7th	Alva de Chiro	Conversations
Mar. 7th	Chris Fewtrell	Animals
Apr. 4th	Heather Shaw	Names
May 2nd	John Green	[Poet - tba]
June 6th	Liz Hickman	tba
July 4th	Group	Read around recent work

Contact: Heather Shaw

heather84mvr@gmail.com

Tel: 01246 236090

'First Tuesday' 6th December 2pm to 4pm

Festive Murder

 Presented by

John Green

Chesterfield Library

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up

Rosie Gilligan presented with plants

Rosie Gilligan was presented with plants after leading an interesting session of Moorside Writers 'First Tuesday' at the Library in Chesterfield on 1st November.

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up

'First Tuesday' 1st November 2pm to 4pm

Writing for Magazines - Fiction and Non-Fiction

 Presented by

 Rosie Gilligan

Rosie is a celebrated local artist and writer of both journalism and fiction. She is a regular contributor to Reflections and many other magazines.

Chesterfield Library

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up

'First Tuesday' 4th October 2pm to 4pm

'Journeys' 

 Presented by

 Stuart Randall

Chesterfield Library

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up

'First Tuesday' 6th September 2pm to 4pm

'Villains' 

 Presented by

 Heather Shaw

Chesterfield Library

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up

Moorside Members at Holymoorside Queen’s Birthday event - June 11th

Members of Moorside Writers braved the outdoors on Saturday 11th June to take part in an entertainment afternoon to celebrate the Queen’s 90th birthday. 

Contributions ranged from People pleasing Places: 1926, to 400 years after Shakespeare with Titania, A Windsor Childhood, extracts from King-Queen Jack, to the many houses of The Queen. Moorside Writers received applause at the opening of this well-attended multi-talented village event.

'First Tuesday' 7th June 2pm to 4pm

'The Great Outdoors' 

 Presented by

 Liz Hickman

Chesterfield Library

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up

LIFE SENTENCE by Heather Shaw

Now that Roy has taken Ella's clothes to the charity shop, her voice will surely fade away? A month after her funeral was a decent time to wait but what a month it's been. Every time he opened the wardrobe door, her voice droned out.

'You paid way over the odds for that wreath, Roy. Not up to much either, was it?'

'Lunch on a tray again? A slippery slope, Roy, a very slippery slope.'

He chose a charity shop he hadn't been in before, just in case. The thought that Help the Aged or Oxfam supporters might take Ella's voice home with their purchases would be unbearable. But, with any luck, her voice will vanish from the sleeves her arms once slid into, the fastenings she fingered.

He's home now, putting on the kettle, slipping a tea bag into the Keep Calm and Act Dumb mug.

'You're never using that dreadful mug, Roy? Have you seen the state of it? Filthy habit, dunking teabags.'

He tiptoes along the hall and peers up to the shadowy landing. It's no good pretending, is it? Her voice is coming from the spare room where he's piled all her possessions behind a locked door.

Mr. Spock, Roy's Star Trek hero, twitches his pointed ears and advises him to boldly go. Roy puts a toe on the first stair.

He tracks her down to the rosewood, boat-shaped snuff box. When he opens it, her accusations assault him.

'Have you seen the dust on the skirting boards, Roy? A tad more effort, I think. We know what happens to idle hands, don't we?'

'You've never been out in that sweater, not with those trousers.'

Roy slams shut the lid.

*

There's a bustle in the Flea Market, different from normal Market Days. The arrangement of stalls is the same but bunches of carrots, rolls of fabric and pirated DVD's never inspire this buzz of serendipity. Ella wouldn't come near what she called Other People's Cast-Offs, which, given her attachment to The Antiques Road Show, was strange. But then, as Mr. Spock has often pointed out, human illogic is a constant.

Patting his pocket every few moments, Roy saunters through the rows of stalls. When he arrives at Bits 'n Bobs, run by the gangly woman with a disarray of blonde hair, he stops. Her stall is a mess and, as Roy knows from previous visits, she has no idea what's there.

He's nonchalant, unhurried. He picks up a fake Tiffany vase, a paperback called Of Human Bondage, a necklace made from dirty buttons.

'Anything you fancy?' the woman says.

'I'll have this, please.' Roy hands over a fluted, green glass vase. '50p right? Could I trouble you for a bag?'

She looks surprised but turns away to scrabble in a cardboard box.

Looking straight ahead, Roy reaches into his pocket, extracts the snuff box and slides it into the space left by his purchase.

He buys a coffee at the snack bar, sits on a plastic chair, within sight and sound of Bits 'n Bobs, and waits.

'This is nice.' The tone is enthusiastic. 'There's no price sticker. How much is it?'

The woman holding the rosewood snuff box looks jolly, the sort of woman who'd appreciate the finer points of Star Trek, be happy dunking tea-bags into Keep Calm mugs.

The stallholder pushes her fingers through her hedge of hair, narrows her eyes, appraises the customer. 'Oh yes, a nice piece that.'

'My son-in-law collects snuff boxes,' the woman says,' but he's definitely not got one like this.'

'Boat shape,' the stallholder says. 'Very collectable. It belonged to an old lady who spent a lot of time in the Far East. Shall we say, twenty pounds?'

'As much as that?' Uncertainty wipes out the jolly smile. 'I'm not sure....'

'I could go to fifteen, as a special favour to a genuine collector.'

'I'll have to think about it.'

The stallholder shrugs.

Roy watches the jolly woman wander around the other stalls. Every few seconds, she glances back to Bits 'n Bobs. He creates a family life for her, a devoted husband, a daughter who pops round several times a week, a gaggle of golden-haired grandchildren. The son-in-law, when his job in a caring profession allows, helps out with the garden, decorating, DIY. And in those rare, precious moments he has to himself, he handles his snuff boxes, strokes intricate inlaid patterns, lifts the lids...

What if Ella's voice doesn't fade from the box? He can't risk allowing her malevolence to poison someone else's family.

The jolly woman has reached the end of the row of stalls, is turning back, decision etched on her face.

No! The scream of protest surges up Roy's throat, is swallowed, threatens again. He leaps up. The plastic chair overturns. The snack bar man yells, 'Steady on, pal.'

The Bits 'n Bobs woman glances at him. 'Back again?'

With one hand Roy grabs Of Human Bondage; the other hand envelops the snuff box and slides it off the edge of the stall.

'Thirty pence, the Somerset Maugham novel, ' the stallholder says.

Roy hands over the coins. He feels the jolly woman at his side. The novel is under his arm. The snuff box is in his pocket. Slowly, he walks away. 

Heather Shaw March 2016

'First Tuesday' 3rd May 2pm to 4pm

'Breaking the Rules' 

 Presented by

 Chris Fewtrell

Chesterfield Library

'First  Tuesday' Meetings are held between 2 pm and 4pm every month except August and are suitable for anyone  who is interested in discussing and undertaking practical exercises in creative writing - prose or poetry

They are held in the Meeting Room Lower Ground Floor - Next to 'Browser' Cafe 

No booking necessary- just turn up

Beginning, Middle, End - A Writing Exercise

INTRODUCTION

It was Aristotle, apparently, who first drew attention to what he considered necessary in the structure of a piece of writing - he was speaking of drama but I think it's applicable to most creative writing.

He said

'A whole is what has a beginning, a middle and an end.'

Other people have had ideas about what order these should come in and we'll come to that later.

CHRONOLOGICAL STRUCTURE

Billy Connolly's poem Aristotle considers these three aspects of structure.

Aristotle BY BILLY COLLINS

This is the beginning.

Almost anything can happen.

This is where you find

the creation of light, a fish wriggling onto land,

the first word of Paradise Lost on an empty page.

Think of an egg, the letter A,

a woman ironing on a bare stage

as the heavy curtain rises.

This is the very beginning.

The first-person narrator introduces himself,

tells us about his lineage.

The mezzo-soprano stands in the wings.

Here the climbers are studying a map

or pulling on their long woollen socks.

This is early on, years before the Ark, dawn.

The profile of an animal is being smeared

on the wall of a cave,

and you have not yet learned to crawl.

This is the opening, the gambit,

a pawn moving forward an inch.

This is your first night with her,

your first night without her.

This is the first part

where the wheels begin to turn,

where the elevator begins its ascent,

before the doors lurch apart.

This is the middle.

Things have had time to get complicated,

messy, really. Nothing is simple anymore.

Cities have sprouted up along the rivers

teeming with people at cross-purposes—

a million schemes, a million wild looks.

Disappointment unshoulders his knapsack

here and pitches his ragged tent.

This is the sticky part where the plot congeals,

where the action suddenly reverses

or swerves off in an outrageous direction.

Here the narrator devotes a long paragraph

to why Miriam does not want Edward's child.

Someone hides a letter under a pillow.

Here the aria rises to a pitch,

a song of betrayal, salted with revenge.

And the climbing party is stuck on a ledge

halfway up the mountain.

This is the bridge, the painful modulation.

This is the thick of things.

So much is crowded into the middle—

the guitars of Spain, piles of ripe avocados,

Russian uniforms, noisy parties,

lakeside kisses, arguments heard through a wall—

too much to name, too much to think about.

And this is the end,

the car running out of road,

the river losing its name in an ocean,

the long nose of the photographed horse

touching the white electronic line.

This is the colophon, the last elephant in the parade,

the empty wheelchair,

and pigeons floating down in the evening.

Here the stage is littered with bodies,

the narrator leads the characters to their cells,

and the climbers are in their graves.

It is me hitting the period

and you closing the book.

It is Sylvia Plath in the kitchen

and St. Clement with an anchor around his neck.

This is the final bit

thinning away to nothing.

This is the end, according to Aristotle,

what we have all been waiting for,

what everything comes down to,

the destination we cannot help imagining,

a streak of light in the sky,

a hat on a peg, and outside the cabin, falling leaves.

WRITING TASK

Write down five or six things, incidents, images etc. under each of these headings:

beginnings, middles endings.

From this create a piece of your own - poetry or prose

Freytag's Pyramid - a development of Aristotle's theory of structure.

Can apply to poems as well as narratives.

Can add Denouement on the right-hand horizontal

IN MEDIAS RES

Other 'thinkers' have had ideas about the order beginning, middle and ending might appear.

Jean-Luc Goddard [sometimes attributed to other commentators] said that ' A story should have a beginning, a middle and an end but not necessarily in that order.'

Martin Amis's novel Time's Arrow is told backwards

Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca is book-ended by the present and told mostly in flashback

This technique has a venerable history. Its posh name is in medias res which translates as into the middle of things.

Examples of poetry and fiction that starts in the middle:

in medias res: into the middle of things

'Whoever Was Using This Bed' by Raymond Carver

The call comes in the middle of the night, three in the morning, and it nearly scares us to death.

“Answer it, answer it!” my wife cries. “My God who is it? Answer it!”

I can’t find the light, but I get to the other room, where the phone is, and pick it up after the fourth ring.

'The Voice' by Thomas Hardy

Woman much missed how you call to me, call to me

Saying that now you are not as you were

When you had changed from the one who was all to me

But as at first, when our day was fair.

'The Gambler' by Dostoevsky

At length I returned from two weeks leave of absence to find that my patrons had arrived three days ago in Roulettenberg. I received from them a welcome quite different to that which I had expected. The General eyed me coldly, greeted me in rather haughty fashion, and dismissed me to pay my respects to his sister. It was clear that from SOMEWHERE money had been acquired. I thought I could even detect a certain shamefacedness in the General's glance.

'Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening' by Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.

His house is in the village, though;

He will not see me stopping here

To watch his woods fill up with snow.

'Lila' by Marilynne Robinson

The child was just there on the stoop in the dark, hugging herself against the cold, all cried out and nearly sleeping. She couldn't holler any more and they didn't hear her anyway, or they might and that would make things worse. Somebody had shouted, Shut that thing up or I'll do it! and then a woman grabbed her from under the table by her arm and pushed her out onto the stoop and shut the door and the cats went under the house. They wouldn't let her near them any more because she picked them up by their tails sometimes.

Picture + boxes

NB The idea here is to write the synopsis of a story. It's not for writing the story itself.

A similar diagram of the Cinderella story would have:

Beginning: Cinderella is forced to work as a servant to a cruel stepmother and stepsisters.

Middle: In spite of her situation, by using magic, her fairy godmother helps her to attend

the Princes' Ball. She is warned that the magic stops working at midnight. At the

ball she attracts the attention of the Prince but has to hurry away as the clock

strikes midnight. One of her evening slippers is left behind.

End: After a fruitless search for the owner of the slipper, the Price arrives at

Cinderella's house and finds that the slipper fits her. he asks her to marry him.

Cue: violins!

Beginning

Middle

The party gets noisy. Grandpa, hands over his head, is whooping and encouraging everyone to join in. Josie leans over to comfort Daisy who is upset and covering her ears with her hands. Paul glances at Josie, over Daisy's head. The look on his face suggests that this whole thing had been a big mistake.

Ending

WRITING TASK - for a group activity

The picture is the Middle scene of this story. In the Middle box, give the character a name and say what you think is happening. 5 Minutes

Pass the sheet to the next person.

Now fill in the Beginning box. What happened before the Middle? 5 Minutes

Pass sheet on.

Fill in the Ending box. If you can think of a suitable title write it at the top of the Beginning box.

The same technique can be used in individual writing, to help structure the plot of a story or the 'shape' of a poem

Using postcards and pictures.

Choose one picture and use it as one scene in a three scene story.

Heather Shaw