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Rab Wilson at Burns Monument Centre

I now have a new word for my rejections (thanks Janice!) – my back catalogue! So when Ross, the organiser of Rab Wilson’s workshop on Feasts, Festivals, Parades and Pageants phoned to ask if I could submit something on that theme, I had a rummage through my –ahem – back catalogue and found a piece I’d written about when my granny used to take us to Govan to watch the Govan Fair from the windows of her friend’s room and kitchen.

I wasn’t too sure what Rab intended doing with it but we all duly turned up at the appointed hour, five out of the ten participants being from the club. Rab pointed out that many poets had written about festivals including Burns and one, John Ramsay, who’d written The Sports of Fasten's-E'en, a long poem about a long forgotten festival held in Kilmarnock. It had some scurrilous comments about the inhabitants of the small towns round about and by the descriptions of the behaviour of local folk, it’s no surprise it was dropped from the calendar of events.

Then to my effort. Rab read bits of it out and showed a clip of an old film of the Govan Fair in the 1950’s. There was the procession heading up Langlands Road and folk watching from the pavements and the windows, and if only the camera had panned up the street a wee bit, there would have been my brother and I hingin oot the windae tae!

After tea and cakes (though two poor souls went on an enforced diet, seeing as how 10 cakes into 12 doesn’t go) and some warm up exercises, we got down to some writing based on the piece of film which we’d viewed several times over. We only had time to hear a few of our efforts but excellent they were, and with a bit of lick and polish some will most definitely be successes for their writers.

An excellent afternoon which got us all writing and all for a fiver (including the tea and cakes. Sorry Pat!)

Summer Meeting - 31st July, 2013

     There is a definite gastronomic theme to the previous blog reports, so I thought I’d better keep up the tradition.

       Yesterday evening’s bill of fare contained a variety of dishes to suit every mood and palate. First on the table – that would be the ‘table de temps’ by the way (click, clickety, click), was a poetic appetizer in the form of a ‘triolet’, a poetic form  unknown to me, but definitely one to have a go at. We then had a darkly mixed dish with a hint of bitterness that at last faded away entirely. From the children’s menu we had a dollop of evil Aunt Aurora. We had international fare with the intense flavour of social injustice from Devil’s Island and an ‘amuse bouche’ from Mongolia to whet our appetite for a delicacy to come in a few months time. We had a small but subtly flavoured poem, a nostalgic taste of Govan Fare (sorry FAIR!) and to finish, a distinctly Scottish tang with Wayne the wolf and those pesky, wee pigs.

     It might have been raining outside but the warmth of Uuganaa’s hospitality, the excellent contributions and great company brightened up a soggy evening.

     The next read-around - the last before the new session of Ayr Writers’ Club, will be on 21^st August. The venue is still to be decided.

                                                                                  Maggie Bolton

Summer Meeting 17th July, 2013

RECIPE FOR A LITERARY COCKTAIL

Ingredients
•    1 dram of drama, with ‘legal’ spices
•    2 slices of social history, marinated for hundreds of years
•    1 dash of crime novel, with a salty taste
•    1 splash of flash fiction, with a twist in the tale
•    3 portions of short story, flavoured with poignancy, humour and nostalgia
•    1 shot of terror with the treat of the guillotine
•    1 sprig of children’s verse, sprinkled with rhyme and rhythm
•    3 dollops of poetry, fearful and funny

 Method
    Bring all ingredients together in a comfortable, well ventilated room.
    Allow each ingredient time to breathe and infuse with appreciation and advice.
    Add generous amounts of fluid when temperature rises.
    Pause for short break to allow ingredients to settle.
    Continue mixing and lace with laughter for almost 3 hours.
    Finally, add ONE cherry!

WARNING –
 The effects of this cocktail may take some time to wear off.

Thanks to Pat Young for her perfect hosting and all ‘ingredient’ contributors!
Carolyn O’Hara
18th July 2013

Summer Meeting - 3rd July, 2013

This morning I woke up laughing; I’d been dreaming about Maggie’s false teeth. Intrigued? No more than we were. Last night’s readaround was a feast of literary fayre, with almost all the party of thirteen bringing something tasty to the table.

    The first challenge, of course, was making our way to the venue, a significant quest even for the most seasoned of orienteerers. Yet it is a fitting testimony to our collective determination, that there was barely room enough, in Maggie’s generous conservatory, to seat us all.

    As each in turn served up their piece, we laughed, grimaced and sighed in unison. From a humorous recitation, complete with alarmingly accurate sound effects, through several enticing opening pages of crime novels, articles giving vent to the some of life’s frustrations (squirrels, left-handedness and the unwanted attentions of the Chinese tourist paparazzi) and short stories speaking of love and, oh yes, false teeth.

    In the comfort and conviviality of our hideaway, we welcomed each dish, allowing the flavours to settle before adding our unique spice to the mix.

   When darkness surprised us, we realised it surely was time to retrace our steps; hopeful caravans were hastily agreed as one by one cars turned and twisted their way back to the main thoroughfare and peace returned to that particular corner of Kilmaurs.  Each head, no doubt, full of promises to self, to finish that story, add a bit here, remove a word there, something to sleep on and perhaps to dream about. 

Speaking of which, what about Maggie’s false teeth?  Well they weren’t Maggie’s exactly, but it makes a good headline, doesn’t it?

   

Dorothy Gallagher

Summer Meeting 19th June, 2013

Ayr Writers Club Summer Tour

Summer just wouldn’t be summer without a visit to the ice cream parlour, where the range of flavours has everyone wide-eyed and salivating.

So, last week, Ayr Writers had their own taste test of summer delights.  Ann Burnett welcomed 12 club members to her house where we enjoyed sharing a whole range of writing pieces, generating plenty of discussion and laughter. 

From delicious, darkly disturbing short stories to vanilla chick lit; from minty fresh sci-fi to evocative, home-made memoirs and tutti-frutti poetry, we savoured them all.  Some of us sank our teeth into a tasty book review; others enjoyed an Oriental-flavoured excerpt and a short story with hints of passion fruit. And we still had space to sample plenty of scrumptious writing for children.

Thank you to all contributors and especially to Ann for your hospitality on a wonderful summer evening.

(Note to self: You shouldn’t write a blog when you are feeling hungry.)

Rhona Anderson

Treasures Workshop - 15th June, 2013

We arrived one-by-one at the designated time, huddling together for warmth while we waited for the last stragglers to arrive* and listening to the rain as it pelted hard on the wide stone shoulders of the bard, who stood guard outside. When it was time, we began. 

...It was quite a good laugh, actually.

Ayr Writer’s Club was well represented at writer-director Ewan Morrison’s Treasures writing workshop on Saturday, numbering five of the eight in attendance, including Ewan and the facilitator, writer Ross McGregor. Also in attendance were Teddy and Fluff Monkey - venerable old friends of Linda and Babs’ respectively, a representative from the Mesozoic Era (who sat in stony silence throughout) and various other much-treasured objects.

Ewan, author of several highly acclaimed books, including Menage, Swung, Distance and Close your Eyes encouraged us to briefly introduce ourselves and our treasures before giving us a breakdown of the key elements that he suggested should be worked into our stories; the what, where, when and why, and how they might particularly apply to writing about our objects.

From this section of the workshop the keys points were: that however precious our object is to us, its owner, our task as a writer is to find a way to make our story resonate with readers by finding a common theme; to remember to describe our treasure, physically, emotionally – to make it real for readers who haven’t fallen asleep with Fluff Monkey cuddled up close, or spent hours searching nose-pressed-to-the-sand for an elusive cowrie on a wind-swept northern beach; and thirdly to be true to the memory of what our treasure meant to us – when we first realised it was an important piece of our jigsaw – and not ‘learnt’ details filled in after the event. My own ‘cowrie’ for example, should remain a pretty little seashell, the cause of sibling rivalry, and not transform a la Wikipedia into a ‘marine mollusc (genus Cypraea, family Cypraeidae) with a glossy, domed shell and a long narrow opening’.

Ewan proceeded to quiz us one-by-one about our treasures, skilfully drawing a story from each of us by asking questions around our object, about families, memories and emotions, then zoning in on what really made each of our treasures significant and trying to identify a ‘conflict’ for us to use as the basis of our tales. Suddenly our seemingly mundane objects became the means to bare our souls, launch of into wild flights of futuristic fantasy, or examine the ever shifting society around us; the possibilities were endless!

All in all it was an enjoyable workshop and I think we each left feeling inspired to find the story hidden somewhere within our treasure. 

 *Janice
 

Ewan Morrison’s treasure story

Ross McGregor’s Treasure Workshop blog post

written by FN


 

Book Launch - A Taste For Malice by Michael J. Malone

12th June, 2013 saw the launch of Michael J. Malone's latest book, A Taste For Malice, at Carnegie Library, Ayr.

Boswell Book Festival. The World's Only Biography Festival. The Glastonbury Experience for Booker Lovers - 17th to 19th May 2013

'Look to your left and then to your right. One of you will die early due to bad genes.'

Steve Jones (Professor of Genetics at UCL)

'Is that because,' whispers my friend, 'their trousers are too tight?'

I've never been to Glastonbury but it can't be more fun than the Boswell Book Festival.

The annual Boswell Book Festival is so busy and has so many eminent speakers, it is only possible to give a snapshot of how enjoyable and informative it is. I have only splashed a few dabs of paint at the canvas.

My first talk was with Michael J Malone, http://mickmal1.blogspot.co.uk/ (an AWC former president and a thoroughly good egg), of 'Carnegie's Call' being interviewed with Sir Tom Hunter about Scottish entrepreneurs. The messages I took away were; Michael's got a new book 'A Taste for Malice' coming out in May 2013 with a book launch at the Ayr Carnegie Library on Wed, June 12 at 7pm, and failure in life is not the problem, the challenge is how you deal with that failure. Something every writer should mull over.

After a quick pit stop in the café where you rub shoulders with fellow AWC members, published writers, famous faces (it is uncool to gawp) and a tribe (is that the right word? Maybe it should be pack) of Hunter wellies, it is time for the next talk with James Naughtie (of Radio 4). His amusing and intelligent discourse was about his book on 'The New Elizabethans' which consisted of pen portraits of sixty most influential people of The Queen's reign. 

The Festival was close enough to go home at 3.30, dry my socks, eat cheese on toast, wash the mud out of my crevices and get back to see a sublime session with John Sessions. 

On Sunday the rain stopped, the sun appeared and the Festival experience continued with an erudite talk by the renowned scientist Steve Jones. He covered so much territory that no one could have left with an empty notebook.

My Festival ended with Tam Dalyell and The Duke of Buccleuch discussing some of their ancestors but particularly some of the women, who acted as hinges during difficult times to hold their families and properties together.

Then off home exhausted but elated by an inspiring weekend.

I only heard about the Festival after I joined the Writers' group. There are always events like this and when you pitch up there are always familiar faces ready to give you a cheery greeting. If you have been thinking about becoming more proactive with your writing or you just want to get out of a rut and meet some charming people then give the Ayr Writers' Club a thought.

I've never been to Glastonbury but … Who needs it when they can have Boswell.

PW