Things and Gatherings: part two

Things and Gatherings: part two

This is the second half of the keynote presentation I gave to the DeathWrites RSE network at Glasgow University. Click here to read Part One. We left off thinking about how the objects we use and live with are actually nodes in a vast web of connections, ideas,...
Things and Gatherings: part one

Things and Gatherings: part one

I was recently invited to give a keynote presentation at Glasgow University, for the research network DeathWrites. Co-ordinated by Dr Amy Shea, Dr Elizabeth Reeder, and Dr Naomi Richards, the project aims to develop and support a network of Scotland-based writers from...
Creativity as practice

Creativity as practice

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, if you have been one of my coaching clients, or if you’ve been one of my students over the years, you’ll know I am a big fan of approaching our creative work as a practice. Practice is a word that has so many useful...
When the Grass Dances

When the Grass Dances

If you have ever been to Orkney you will know it is a landscape dominated by grassland. With few trees here, it’s the shimmering of grass that marks the movement of wind and sun, and its growth and decay colours the changing seasons. Modern farming methods mean that...
Silence is ecological

Silence is ecological

One of the things I’ve been enjoying about working with other artists and writers is the discussions that open up around the work that my coaching clients are engaged with. Ideas I am interested in find new resonance in conversation with others. Old ones bloom back...
Cal Flyn’s Islands of Abandonment

Cal Flyn’s Islands of Abandonment

This week I’m delighted to speak with award-winning writer and journalist Cal Flyn about her recent book Islands of Abandonment: Life in the Post-Human Landscape.  The book is infused with a tentative kind of hopefulness, full of vivid examples of the resilience...