Winter Warmer Workshops 2021

These workshops, which I ran for the first time in 2020, were the best thing I did last year. I got to know and work with some lovely people, who joined in with the writing exercises, discussion of the readings and artists we looked at each week. We got to know each other over the eight weeks, and it was great fun, so I’m doing it again, once more via Zoom.

Designed to see us through the dark nights of November and December, each week there will be a different theme. We’ll explore different genres of writing, writing exercises, discussion, opportunities for reading and feedback of each other’s work and more.

Even though we are a year on, and society has opened up, many of us will still be staying inside, socially distancing and looking for community, as we move through the last quarter of another challenging year. I know I will be, which is partly why I thought this might appeal to people who would normally get together around a table in a cafe or pub, to share ideas about writing and try things out.

I can’t run workshops like this at the moment, which is how I normally do it – and how I would prefer to meet everyone. The joy of offering workshops online is that we can still meet up and do the writing and have the fun, and we can do it from wherever we are in the world – which is amazing.

The idea behind the ‘Winter Warmer’ aspect is to take us through these dark, damp nights, with reading, writing and discussion to keep us going. Creative prompts and thinking to inspire us to write. All of which will take place around our own virtual fire, where we can share stories and have a laugh together.

Each week is a 90 minute workshop, with a presentation, writing exercises, time for feedback and discussion. All in a friendly virtual space on Zoom.

Designed for keen writers working at all levels, we will try out all kinds of writing in a constructive and supportive atmosphere. You will also have a chance to send me a piece of your work, generated from the workshop each week, for written feedback, if you would like to do so.

Early bird booking price of 90 Euro / £80 until 10^th October

Full price after that is 140 Euro / £120

8 weekly sessions via Zoom on Monday evenings from 7.30pm – 9pm

1^st / 8^th / 15^th / 22^nd / 29^th November

6^th / 13^th / 20^th December

Email me to book or for further information:

words@lucyfurlong.com

Winter Warmer Workshop 2020 Testimonials

“Absolutely breath-taking journey into a world of places and people that I’d never heard of before.” Maggie

“I loved the source materials and how they all linked in, they really resonated with me. So much there to consider.” Danielle

“After doing your course I want to focus more on poetry, as you have really encouraged me to take my poetry further. Thank you.” Louise

“I enjoyed meeting other writers and hearing the work they read out as well as their comments and thoughts.” Janet

Waking Up – A Writing Workshop for Brigid’s Day

I’ve still got some spaces on my next workshop – join me! It’s a one-off for 2 hours. Friendly, no pressure and lots of opportunities to think, talk and write at your own pace in a supportive environment. I’ve always found this time of year to be a perfect time for getting projects going, germinating those thought seeds stored from the dark Winter months… message me for more info or email (address in the pic below)

Verse Aid : Poems for the Earth

Back in January I was honoured to be invited by Poets for the Planet to run two workshops at their launch event at the Society Of Authors in London.

“Poets for the Planet is a community of kindred poets, performers, artists and creative activists raising their voices to engage with climate and ecological emergency through poetry in all its forms.”

This took place on Saturday February 8th, and was a fantastically busy day with a Poem-A-Thon taking place throughout the day, alongside other workshops from Jan Heritage, Grace Pengelly, Dom Bury, Philip Gross and Clare Pollard.

In the evening there was a gala reading featuring Imtiaz Dharker, winner of the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry, alongside acclaimed poets Mona Arshi, Hannah Lowe and Jacqueline Saphra.

My workshops, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, were based around my latest chapbook and walking project, Sward : Skin of the Earth, and aimed to get people thinking about their local green and wild spaces, how to write about them and how to value them.

Here’s the blurb from eventbrite:

Skin of the earth: Walking and Ecopoetry

Exploring family memories of and connections to local wild spaces through walking and writing about them. We will look at the writings of Victorian author and naturalist Richard Jefferies and think about the concept of deep topography.

I was delighted that both workshops were well attended and each was very different in flavour! The morning workshop was mostly a talking / thinking / exchanging ideas workshop, and the afternoon workshop was a heads-down writing workshop. As each workshop was only 30 minutes long,  a ‘micro-workshop’, I prepared a handout for people to take away with them too.

The monies raised went to two amazing charities:

Founded in 1993, Bees for Development was the first organisation to articulate the reasons why beekeeping is such a useful tool for alleviating poverty while helping to retain biodiversity. http://www.beesfordevelopment.org

International Environmental Charity Earthwatch brings together world-class scientists and individuals from all works of life to work for the good of the planet.

I also took part in the Poem-A-Thon, reading from Sward, and raised money again for Bees for Development – and thanks to everyone who sponsored and supported me!

 

Hogsmill Tiddlers

Hogsmill Tiddler

At the wooden bridge, beside

the washing-willow,

under frayed dare-devil

rope-swing, we small-fry gather;

splash-paddle in the sun-filled

slipstream, our expectant

jam jars perched ready on banks

for contents of day-glo

Hogsmill Tween

nets on bamboo poles,

skim-dunked, dipped into laughing

sparkle, we seek out elusive

piscine lurkers, shoal-darters,

minnow-school pretty-carpers,

spike-backed silver-bellied

sticklebacks, shimmer and shift

in ever-changing shallow-shadows.

We graft all afternoon, rewarded

by encounters with small wildness,

iridescent scale inspection

Kids at the third bridge, 6 Acre Meadow

through jars held up to the light.

A busy day meeting our fishy friends,

our neighbours of the water;

we send them back before barefoot-flapping,

wet and toasted, up the hill home.

 

Over the Fields poetry map

Hogsmill Tiddlers was originally published as one of the poems on my now sold-out Over the Fields map, back in September 2015. It has since been published in The Countryman magazine and is also used in teaching materials for the Open University’s MA in Creative Writing.

 

 

I have just pinned Hogsmill Tiddlers to another map, showing the location of the poem, on the Places of Poetry web site. This is an AHRC and Arts Council funded project which “aims to use creative writing to prompt reflection on national and cultural identities in England and Wales, celebrating the diversity, heritage

laughing sparke

and personalities of place.”

We still cross the bridge nearly every day on our walks ‘Over the Fields’. Five generations of Furlongs and counting…

Court Farm Writers

Court Farm Writers is a new writing group, and it starts tomorrow, Wednesday 16th May! Each week, you will be able to try different styles and forms of writing in a relaxed, friendly and supportive workshop.

Tolworth Court Farm Fields, ancient farmland and nature reserve, opposite the garden centre, on the Kingston Road

Meeting in the comfortable surroundings of Court Farm Garden Centre Cafe, we will talk about writing and look at various forms, including poetry, short stories, memoir and novel writing. There will be writing exercises to try out and techniques to explore. Each session works as a stand alone, or as part of a bigger exploration of writing in all its guises.

Come and have some fun with words!

Sessions run from 10.00am – 11.30am and cost £8.00 in advance and £10.00 on the day. Price includes a tea or coffee.

Court Farm Garden Centre Cafe, Old Kingston Road, KT4 7QH

Contact me via email to book your place: words@lucyfurlong.com

Facebook event here

 

Ghosts POMs and Panopticons: Writing Workshop at the Morpeth Arms

It’s a fair cop Guv’

This Thursday evening, 16th June, I am delighted to be running a writing workshop as part of SouthWestFest, at the Morpeth Arms pub in Pimlico.

The Morpeth Arms

The Haunted Holding Cells

Ghost Cam in the Snug

This haunted London pub has a row of holding cells in its cellar, which were used as holding cells for the prisoners of the infamous Millbank Penitentiary which, in the 19th century, stood on the land now occupied by Tate Britain. The prison was built as a panopticon, or ‘all-seeing’ prison, and was designed by Jeremy Bentham, who saw it as “a mill for grinding rogues honest” .

Un-rehabilitated prisoners were taken through the dark maze of tunnels beneath the streets of Pimlico to the lock up under the pub, where they were kept before being put on boats at Millbank pier, and eventually transported ‘Down Under’…

Panopticon Prison Plan

Millbank Pier (with MI5 in the background)

Millbank Prisoners

There are records of prisoners and prison officers dying in these cells, and in the tunnels connected to the prison, and as Gary, the landlord at the pub, was telling me when I went to do some research, a team of paranormal enthusiasts have carried out readings in the cells late at night….Brrrrrr

Gary very kindly took me and Sinead Keegan, a trustee of the festival, for a tour of the spooky cells, and answered questions about the pub and its history. As MI5 is situated directly across the river, the Morpeth Arms has some fascinating pictures and snippets of information about famous spies on its walls- which could be great stimulus for a flash fiction thriller!

Do join me in the snug, for what I hope will be an enjoyable couple of hours writing stories inspired by this fascinating place!

The workshop is FREE but numbers are limited so please email me to book your place: words@lucyfurlong.com and see the Facebook event here.

Ghosts, POMS and Panopticons at The Morpeth Arms, Thursday 16th June from 7.30-9.30pm, 58 Millbank, Westminster, London, SW1P 4RW

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Lurgy, Climate Change and Hobbitses

Over the Fields walk, January 2016

 

Last Sunday me, my son and my dad went for our first proper walk Over the Fields this year. We have all been poorly and the weather has been rubbish but I was desperate to get out and have a walk over there in time for Imbolc/ Candlemas. This is the traditional time of year for sighting the first snowdrops, and maybe to see buds and Blackthorn blossom. With such a mild Winter there was plenty of new green shoots to see, trees in full blossomy bloom, new nettles and dock leaves, hawthorn leaves unfurling… I wrote about the walk for local ecologist Alison Fure’s excellent blog, and you can read what I wrote here.

On Monday afternoon I finally gave up battling with the lurgy I’ve had on and off since mid-December, and went to bed. I’ve been there ever since, apart from a trip to the doctor on Friday. Eye infection, throat infection, chest virus, acute exacerbation of asthma…I’ve been fighting it for ages but finally it got the better of me. This has resulted in a week of cancelled teaching. Not great when you are a self-employed single parent… but…mustn’t grumble eh… my son is being looked after by my amazing dad, and I am safe and warm, if feeling particularly grim.

The silver lining is that being stuck in bed means I have watched a few films. Most affecting of these is This Changes Everything, narrated by Naomi Klein and based on her book of the same name. I need to watch it again and I would recommend that you need to watch it too. So should everyone. It is tough to watch in places but breathtakingly filmed and well put together. A mixture of environmental disaster and tragedy, and the heartening, brave protests of people on the front line, whose land and lives are being profoundly affected by the atrocities of fossil fuel companies and big business. The message is clear and simple. Capitalism vs the Climate- if we don’t fight it we are doomed. Now I need to read the book.

I also watched all of the Hobbit film trilogy- and been for the most part pleasantly surprised; I saw and enjoyed the first one at the flicks, missed the second and third, and was put off watching them by a couple of friends who said the story was poorly handled, there was far too much emphasis on spiders, and that the book had been done a total disservice by the drawing out of the plot to nearly 9 hours of film…I loved the LOTR films but was, like many people, rather surprised and slightly cynical at the announcement that the Hobbit would be made as a three-part series of prequels.

So…slightly late to the party…I watched the final two parts this week. Yes, the story is drawn out but I think it’s ok, if a bit baggy . I find the use of CGI action scenes which look like computer games (and *are* constructed for the computer games market- I know, the biggest part of the film business these days) distracting and annoying- formulaic and jammed into the action of the films- but, otherwise, I thoroughly enjoyed The Desolation of Smaug and The Battle of the Five Armies- and I would happily watch them again.

After watching This Changes Everything, The Hobbit trilogy of films became a metaphor for the rampaging greed of capitalism destroying nature, Power Over instead of Power With.

I am also re-reading Rebecca Solnit’s Wanderlust: A History of Walking- a fascinating, wonderful read and, as this year I am especially committed to developing my walking/writing/making practice, a necessary one too. Once again, in light of what Klein says at the start of This Changes Everything, about the idea promulgated during the Enlightenment, of Nature as something to be conquered and used for ‘our’ benefit- the history of walking ties in, in some ways, with this view of what Nature is and is not…thought-provoking stuff and I will be returning to it again and again no doubt.

Walking into 2016

sunset at Avebury, December 28th 2015

I haven’t been blogging much recently- in fact hardly at all. 2015 turned into a crazy, exciting, busy year, creatively. As a result, I found at the end of the year that I had dropped some important threads, including my blog. I hope to pick up where I left off and carry on knitting this strangely-shaped patchwork blanket of random writings on a much more regular basis. Call it a New Year’s Resolution if you like, maybe it is one – my blog has been a writing rudder in the past, steering me through events, successes, failures, moods, frustrations and obsessions…and I hope it will do that again.

Lots of great stuff happened last year – I feel very grateful and fortunate to have met and worked with some lovely, talented and generous people, and to have achieved some of my ambitions for my writing. I will write more about this but I don’t know if that will happen here and now…it might happen randomly and at will, rather than any attempt to be chronological and consistent and comprehensive…

It was good to go away at Christmas and New Year and take a much-needed breather and see some new places and friendly faces.

hide and seek at the stones, Avebury

We traveled to stay in a tiny cottage on the edge of a farm in Wiltshire, where I hoovered up Viv Albertine’s memoir in a couple of days; wandered around Avebury re-acquainting myself with its stones and trees, after eating lunch in the Red Lion; found a tiny magical part of Calne; stayed in a very rainy Bath and re-visited the Roman Baths and Sally Lunn’s – amazing lavender cake with rose buttercream filling!

Then we were very lucky to be invited to stay with one of oldest friends and her partner and sons in Cardiff, where we saw the New Year in hearing socialist anthems sang exquisitely by members of Cardiff Reds Choir, who happen to live two doors down from my friend’s house, and who were having a party, which we were then invited to. The next two days were filled with trips to the funfair and Dr Who Experience, home-made curry and apple pie…a great way to see the New Year in – best one I’ve had in years. Thanks for everything, Tania XXX

 

 

Back Soon…Time Flies

This may the least amount of blogging I’ve done in the last nearly ten years… it’s been an eventful and exciting year so far. Very busy creatively- and professionally- in fact the two are combining nicely- which was always the plan- with all kinds of stuff happening, happened, and with a bit of luck and a following wind, going to happen…

So this is a holding post to say I will be posting here again on a more regular basis, with all kinds of news of the soon-to-be-published Over The Fields map, plus an update on what I’ve been up to over the last few months (mainly to remind myself and gather my thoughts as we head towards Lammas), and also to write about other stuff that will be happening this Autumn…

In the meantime- here I am at the Carshalton Time Machine…more now, and then, soon…

 

Carshalton-On-Sea Festival

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This has all come together rather quickly, and impressively, and I am delighted to be so involved. The main event for me and my other poetical colleagues, Sarah Dawson, Neil Horabin and David Russamano, is the Water Poets at 1pm in the Cryer Theatre, Saturday 20th June. There will be tonnes of other excellent stuff to see and do over the weekend!