Incorporating Writing
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incorporating writing Issue 4 Vol 3 REVOLUTION REVIEWS Jocelyn Hurndall Lionel Shriver CK Williams Roddy Doyle Anthony Capella and much more 4 pages of opportunities and industry news George Szirtes - Marina Lewycka - E-Revolution Incorporating Writing Contents (ISSN 1743-0380) Editorial Team Page Editorial Managing Editor New to the Neighbourhood 3 Andrew Oldham Sarah Hesketh introduces this issue and tells us about her auspicious start. Deputy Editor SE/Interviews Sarah Hesketh Interviews Marina Lewycka 14 Deputy Editor Midlands/Articles Sarah Hesketh meets the author. Fiona Ferguson George Szirtes 32 Deputy Editor NW/Reviews Sarah Hesketh catches up with the poet and discusses the future of UEA. G.P.Kennedy Articles Sales & Marketing Manager The Name Means Voices 5 Graeme Hind After Tom Spurling tackled travel writing in the last issue, readers have called for more. Columnists Dan McTiernan, Andrew ODonnell, Flax Books: A New Voice 8 Dave Wood, Sharon Sadle. Sara Hymas of Flax Books, tells us about what they hope to achieve. Contributors Janet Aspey, Claire Boot, Ben Words in Wales 24 Felsenburg, Sara Hymas, James Claire Boot reveals the new face of Johnson, Tom Spurling, Bridget literature in Wales. Whelan, Rebecca Wombwell Columns Cover Art A Novel Death 11 Samantha Mills Dan McTiernan talks candidly about his own revolution. Design Marsh EDITORS NOTE: Sharon Sadles column has now come to an end and will be replaced Contact Details from the next issue. http://www.incorporatingwriting.co.uk [email protected] Artwork Perfect Eye 28 Cover artist, Samantha Mills, exhibits Incorporating Writing is an imprint of The Incwriters some of her work. Society (UK). The magazine is managed by an editorial team independent of The Societys Constitution. Nothing in this magazine may be reproduced in whole or part without Reviews 35 permission of the publishers. We cannot accept responsi- bility for unsolicited manuscripts, reproduction of articles, photographs or content. Incorporating Writing has endeav- oured to ensure that all information inside the magazine is News and Opportunities 47 correct, however prices and details are subject to change. Individual contributors indemnify Incorporating Writing, The Incwriters Society (UK) against copyright claims, monetary claims, tax payments / NI contributions, or any other claims. This magazine is produced in the UK. © The Incwriters Society (UK) 2005 3 incorporating writing New to the Neighbourhood Editorial by Sarah Hesketh processes which govern the Incorporating Writing editorial process, has come to hold the title Revolution (in the regions) I can admit to a vested interest in at least two of the pieces. A Lancastrian by birth, the work of Flax publishing goes a long way to dispelling my prejudice that the Northwest has never put much store by its literary talents. East Lancashires top celebrities include: Wallace Hartley - fiddled on the Titanic whilst every other sensible bugger was trying to get near a lifeboat, Betty Boothroyd high-kicking former Madam speaker, Carl Fogarty World Superbike legend, and John Simm It was hardly the most auspicious of recent star of BBCs nostalgia-fest Life job applications. I had one of the worst on Mars and the first and only famous colds of my life. Two days after New Year alumni of the now defunct Edge End High and I was still feeling the after effects of School, Nelson. I was sixteen years old midnight excesses which included making before I realised Sylvia Plath was buried lemon pigs and singing Auld Lang Syne up the hill and Mytholmroyd was in fact stood on a bench on the top of the birthplace of Ted Hughes, not just a Parliament Hill. Disastrously, my hippy village on the outskirts of Burnley. interview subject had stood me up and so Although all credit to Accrington Arts I was forced to cobble together an article Centre for introducing me to my first based on facts cribbed from a few vague professional poetry reading. The late, press releases with only a leftover batch lamented Michael Donaghy arrived late on of Marks and Spencers reindeer shaped the rattling Transpennine, looking unsure biscuits sustaining my will to live. Yet as to why hed come at all and wondering here I am, newly installed as if he should have brought his passport. Incorporating Writings Interviews Editor. Its funny how things can turn out. Ive More recently, Ive been sampling the already had the pleasure of meeting heady artistic atmosphere of Norwich. Its Benedict Allen (frighteningly articulate, a town where you cant move for fear of anxious to show off his warrior shields) running into a writers group and a new and Daljit Nagra (desperately nice, religion of culture has replaced the old bought me a cup of tea), and I hope to one, as the majority of the citys famously be bringing you more insightful comment numerous churches are now bookshops, from figures in the culture business in the or gallery space or an arts centre. Arts future. council funding is pouring into the county (in a daring escape bid from the Olympics As for this issue which, via the mystical committee, perhaps?) and my interview incorporating writing 4 with George Szirtes examines the future word. Claire Boot examines the of the local monolith that is the UEA remarkably vibrant potential in that Creative Writing Course. strange negative devolution, exploring how Wales has become the British capital of literary festivals. Marina East Lancashires top Lewycka talks about what it means to be celebrities include: Wallace a Ukrainian in Yorkshire (and indeed a Yorkshire woman in the Ukraine) and Hartley - fiddled on the George Szirtes a Hungarian in Norfolk. Titanic whilst every other Plus weve got reviews of Anthony Capella, Roddy Doyle and CK Williams. sensible bugger was trying Not much change from the usual to get near a lifeboat international flavour then. Ive only just moved to the neighbourhood. But its going alright thus far. Ask me ten years ago to give you an example of regional literature and Id probably have thrust James Herriotts collected works at you books that told me about the landscape in which I was living. Since leaving university I havent lived in the same county for more than nine months, whats my regional character now? Can I still claim to be Lancastrian if no longer pronouce coke and cork exactly the same? Am I going Sarah Hesketh is Deputy Editor (SE)/Interviews to start searching for justification for my for Incorporating Writing. Originally from East Lancs she is now enduring the flat lands of irrational hatred of the Yorkshire cricket Norfolk and studying for an MA in creative writing team? I genuinely hope not. But as both at UEA. Szirtes and Marina Lewcyka (both survivors of their own, bloodier revolutions) highlight in this issue, the world gets ever smaller. The massive CALL FOR WRITERS movements within the EU mean that Incorporating Writing will go quarterly in countries like Poland and Hungary are 2007. Themes for 2007 include FOOD just as important a part of our region (October). Guidelines can be obtained now. Their inhabitants are our neighbours from the editors below and, important and fun as it is for literature to assert a local character it has All enquiries and deadline details are to bear in mind that that local character available from: is no longer the figure it once was, and Andrew Oldham (Managing Editor) might be as prone to a shot of vodka [email protected] these days as it is to a pint of Black Fiona Ferguson (Articles Editor) Sheep. [email protected] G.P. Kennedy (Reviews Editor) What else do we have in this issue then? [email protected] Tom Spurling gives us the second of his astonishing reports from South Africa, www.incorporatingwriting.co.uk where revolution is still a dangerous 5 incorporating writing The Name Means Voices Article by Tom Spurling A bakkie-load of Shangaan construction Kruger National Park, fifteen young workers huddles tightly in their rainbow Shangaan and Sotho women are learning beanies. The young men slap backs and to tell their stories straight. flash smiles as they scoot past a bevy of Boers dressed head-to-high-knee in Its the first Wednesday of the month, khaki. The property developers suck their and time for the Editorial Meeting. The skafes and puff steam rings through the first edition of the signature publication, icy air. Its Wednesday morning in the The Amazwi Villager, is just three weeks Hoedspruit Wildlife Estate. away, and the students are restless to see their names on the page. Lydia, fresh Across the R40, a stream of Toyota Hi-Ace from her Rise & Shine snack stall, sits taxis pull up in front of La Bamba quietly in a huge apricot sun hat; supermarket. Farmhands and well-made Constance dishes out sweet cherry wives banter in circles on the steps and bubblegum at a rand for six pieces; and chew fried chips, the air already full of Maria, the dressmaker, in her black velvet sweat and laughter. Army green safari boots and a white woolen sweater, laughs vehicles crowd the petrol bowsers, and to herself, no longer crying beneath a from a cloud of dust comes the inaugural Marula tree, no longer so ready to quit class at the Amazwi School of Media Arts. the bush beat. Here in South Africa, where history is The newly built classroom of clay- delicate and fresh, revolution is a coloured concrete, thatched roof and high dangerous word. Hundreds were exiled wooden beams echoes with Tsonga for imagining a post-Apartheid state, and whispers. The students are reluctant to millions suffered trying to outlive it. But present their new assignment ideas. The in this sleepy tourist town, on the edge of editor is ready to bend their ideas to fit.