Roger Horberry explains how to bring your writing to life. Don’t confine yourself to literal descriptions. Instead, bring your writing to life by creating word pictures, the more vivid the better. Key figures here are metaphor, simile, metonymy and synecdoche. Not only is verbal imagery highly expressive, it’s also highly memorable. If a reader [...]
Well-known sage Miss Piggy never eats more than she can lift. Before PD James, Elmore Leonard said if it sounds like writing I rewrite it. (Thanks for those who pointed it out.) Here’s a collection of our favourite writing advice. Sara Sheridan My best writing advice is from Raymond Chandler. Paraphrased: If the narrative [...]
Is we the new I? asks soon-to-be collaborative author, Paul Redstone? In a daring collaboration with 14 other writers, Redstone describes what the first workings of a collective novel might look like where ‘no one writer is in control’, and the first words are written in a Highland retreat. There’s a well-known quotation often [...]
Virginia Woolf said that, ‘to write a work of genius is almost always a feat of prodigious difficulty…dogs will bark, people will interrupt, money must be made.’ 26ers discuss the struggle of putting pen to paper and share their tips to overcome it. Mike Reed In terms of getting that novel, screenplay, whatever out from [...]
In the third of our series ‘The Story Works’ with D&AD, Fraser Southey tells the life story of a storyteller in 10 ‘Once Upon a Times’ Read Fraser’s piece at D&AD
Moleskine or bus ticket, Rymans or Redstone, plain paper or gridded, 26ers get under the skin of something close to our hearts – the notebook. Anne Aylor I’m a Ryman’s girl. Habit started on May 1979. First line in writer’s notebook No 1: “If you are afraid of loneliness don’t marry” Anton Chekhov as quoted [...]
Andy Hayes, client services director at Quietroom works a four-day week, giving him time to do the washing up and create projects like 26 Miles, Throwaway Lines at 26. One Work for a company that values your experience as much as your time. I feel lucky I stumbled upon Quietroom, after 20 years working in [...]
Still loved up after Valentine’s Day, a few 26ers wear their hearts on their sleeves and share their thoughts on love letters. Four Letters of Love Thinking of love letters makes me think of Four Letters of Love, a sadly overlooked first novel by Niall Williams, but fortunately still in print. It’s an elegiac tale [...]
Elise Valmorbida, co-organiser of Wordstock 2012, has some exciting news. The Wordstock video is being edited right now. And it’s going to play a big part in making this year’s Wordstock even better than the last. Wordstock was a day of brilliant speakers and workshops, with plenty of food and talk in between. To make [...]
Rishi Dastidar started a new job this month. He’s joined onefinestay as head of brand. But, even when you start in a company as head of something, there are still first day nerves to contend with. Here are Rishi’s three ways to settle into a new job. So, this month, I started a new job, [...]
In the fourth of our series from 26’s collaboration with Designer Breakfasts, Elen Lewis writes a story about flying to the sun after hearing Richard Seymour’s talk ‘The Pilot’s Prayer’. Sunshine By Elen Lewis I find Sasha measuring a sunbeam in the garden. She has a jam jar, a piece of string and a pair [...]
You’ve seen the objects. You’ve read the sestudes. Now get ready to watch the movie. Here’s Sarah Farley to introduce 26 Treasures of Childhood on film. In December I met up with the lovely Faye Sharpe and Gillian Colhoun to spend a day exploring the Modern British Childhood exhibition at the Museum of Childhood. 26 [...]
John Simmons gave out copies of ‘26 Treasures of Childhood’ to various clients before Christmas. One of them, from a London law firm, passed her copy of the booklet to her old school teacher in Australia. This is an email John received from that teacher. Dear John, Congratulations on your 26 Treasures anthology. It is [...]
Here’s a feature that’s running in the January issue of Unfiltered, the magazine of the Scotch Malt Whisky Society. It’s about a project based around a special collection of whiskies – 26 Malts, which all started with a spirited conversation between writers Stuart Delves and Jamie Jauncey, and designer Damian Mullan. Over the past 30 [...]
Sophie Reynolds, festival officer at the V&A’s Department of Theatre and Performance, gives a writer’s perspective on why the Christmas story really works. The Nativity is a plain, unvarnished tale in which remarkable things happen. And it is a remarkable story in its own right. One of the surprising things about it is that for [...]
Chris Martin thinks everyone should read comics and says there is much to be learnt from them if you’re a writer. Following on from his inspiring Pecha Kucha at Wordstock, here are three ways why reading comics will make you a better writer. Pow! Zap! Kapow! Chris has been championing comics in the workplace for [...]
This time in 2011 we were deep in our Christmas storytelling project, 26 Stories of Christmas. We asked 26 writers to choose the object that means Christmas to them. Then we paired them randomly with another writer’s object, and asked each to write a 500-word story. From 1 – 26 December, we published a story [...]
Alya Al-Khatb was one of two young 26 members to be awarded the very first Dark Angels scholarships, following a competition in the September 26 newsletter. These free places on the Full Foundation Course were open to 26 members under the age of 30. Here Alya tells us what it was like to flex her [...]
It’s that time of year when we’re all wondering what to get our friends and family for Christmas. Luckily, we’ve thought of you and have struck a great deal with publishers Unbound to get 26 members a £10 discount on any Unbound book. You might not want to look further than 26’s own Unbound book [...]
