Writer in ResidenceTag

November Writer in Residence Helen Walsh on Gardening, Edinburgh, & Eating Dinner with Hans Gruber

Helen Walsh's Pull Focus (ECW Press) has something for everyone: thrilling intrigue, social commentary, film industry glamour, and a tough protagonist facing crises both personal and professional. The ...

On Listening to Music and Writing a Novel

Do you listen to music as you write? I often do, particularly when writing a short story, but it has been several months since I typed the night away with a melody playing in the background. At this moment, ...

The Joy of Literary Festivals – And Dreams Coming True

It’s hard to believe we’ve come to the end of September and that the time I have been privileged to spend with you on this Open Book platform is almost over. Looking back at what I have shared with ...

A Thousand More Lives: On Reading

I recently stumbled across an article written by Umberto Eco in Rome in 1991, translated into Spanish by Jorge Cruz and published in the Argentinean newspaper La Nación, explaining why he believed that ...

Plant a tree, have a child, write a book? Not so fast!

“Plant a tree, have a child, write a book.” Whether it was Cuban poet and freedom fighter José Martí or some other worthy who first uttered this maxim is irrelevant. What matters is its message: ...

On Translation

My favourite assignment during my time as an undergraduate student at the English Literature Department in Mexico’s National Autonomous University (UNAM), was the translation of a short story of my ...

I believe in... workshops

A escribir se aprende escribiendo, we say in Spanish: It is only by writing that one learns how to write. Lots of writing and reading are an absolute must, but acquiring writing techniques is equally ...

On Federico García Lorca's "Duende"

What immediate need of yours has to be satisfied before you can hit the keyboard? If I had to have a clean house before I sat down to write, I would never have written anything after I got married and ...

Insomniable Grief

Many moons have fallen this way since last did I stand here,the stairwell yawning before me,my naked feet cold and full of pain in the night surrounding meand beneath me gaping back an ocean brackishly ...

Aanii, Boozhoo, hello, hi there and do you speak my language

Language of the day is all about decolonization or re-indigenization and I watch the conversations taking place all over the place by Nish and non-Nish alike discussing points of view on the subject. ...