WritingTag

Getting Started the Long Way Around

I didn't always want to be a writer, mind you, I didn't learn to read or write until I was about 12. I have this auditory learning disability that makes learning things a challenge, most things I can ...

So I Nearly Died

So I almost died and in doing so discovered that dying has the strange effect of stealing my creativity and passion for art and writing, but not because they no longer move me, instead it was because ...

The Writer (You Think) I am

The year before trying out for the Simon Fraser University basketball team, I trained in ways and at an intensity I never before had. I wanted to make that team so badly, so desirous was I to prove myself, ...

Stepping Off the Treadmill

Ten years ago, Tim and I decided to step sideways.I was Artistic Director of a theatre school for children and youth. I was dedicated to the job, but it was completely wearing me down. Tim was teaching ...

What's Beyond: Writing as an Actor, Part 2

One of the important exercises we do in theatre is called “What’s Beyond.” It’s a Viola Spolin exercise to help actors understand the full, inner life of their characters. Viola Spolin is credited ...

Writing as an Actor

I went to theatre school when I was 18. In many ways it was the worst choice I could have made. I was not temperamentally suited to the life of an actor. But the lessons I learned in theatre school have ...

Writing as a Calligrapher

The word calligraphy comes from the Greek. Kali, meaning beautiful, and Graphos, meaning writing. Beautiful writing. It’s a term that was coined after the invention of the printing press, after the ...

Writing What You Don't Know

Write what you know. It’s an adage you are always told as a beginning writer.My first book was definitely written because of what I knew. I had been teaching a studio course on the development of Western ...

Making a skating rink, and other tricks for stepping away from a work-in-progress

On a particularly cold Friday morning, I piled my kids in a car with snow pants and skates and a pile of books and we headed to a cottage rental. We all were desperate for a change of scenery, and I was ...

The Writing Moment with... Spooky Season

I love and dread the fall. The appeals are many: the crackling, fiery colours, the beginning of a new school year, Halloween’s ghoulish joys, the growing chill in the air, and the attendant comfort ...