joanne burns at the Memoir Club for Readers and Writers

Poet joanne burns joins up to talk about memoir or autobiographical moments that sometimes influence her work, in conversation with Barbara Brooks. Joanne is an accomplished poet and one of the best social satirists we have, with a subtle but wicked sense of humour. She's a legend - Spineless Wonders have just named their prose-poem award after her. http://shortaustralianstories.com.au/ joanne is going to treat us to short readings from her work too.  The Memoir Club is a communal space to meet other writers and readers and converse about all things to do with reading and writing memoir. Meetings on the last Tuesday of every month, at the Randwick Literary Institute. Delicious food from Rosada's Kitchen. Memoir Club Meeting:                 Tuesday, 25 June 2013 Randwick Literary Institute RSVP (please say whether you would like some food) joanne burns in conversation with Barbara Brooks About the Memoir Club: a meeting place for readers and writers  When: last Tuesday of every month (30 July, 27 August, 24 September etc.)  Time: 6 - 8.30 PM  Where: The Randwick Literary Institute, 60 Clovelly Road, Randwick NSW 2031 Tel: 02-9398 5203 (for directions and venue info). Street parking is available. Clovelly bus 339 on the doorstep. For how to get there, see: http://randwickliteraryinstitute.com.au/faqs/ What: A communal space to meet other writers and readers and converse about all things to do with reading and writing memoir. We are interested in all kinds of life stories and in different ways of telling them. The genre of life writing and the possibilities of expanding and reworking the genre is exciting to us. Therefore we have a somewhat open and inclusive approach to what makes a memoir, and we hope you do too! Here is a space to connect with others and share ideas, questions and just hang out. Each meeting will start off with a talk, conversation or discussion about a particular topic or book, sometimes with a guest speaker or facilitator, then we move to an informal gathering and catch up. Donation: $10 at the door for hall hire, refreshments and speakers. Food: $15 for a plate of delicious vegan finger food from Rosada's Kitchen (different each meeting). Future Speakers: Drusilla Modjeska (The Mountain), Mary Zournazi (on filmmaker Agnes Varda), Patti Miller (The Mind of a Thief) and Adam Aitken (Eighth Habitation) will join us at future sessions to talk about their memoirs or the memoir aspects of their work. RSVP: Please RSVP to Beth at bywritingworks@gmail.com for room and catering purposes Look forward to seeing you there! Please do pass information on to anyone who might be interested in this community gathering.   mem·oir   /ˈmemˌwär/ Noun A historical account or biography written from personal knowledge. An autobiography or a written account of one's memory of certain events or people. "I wrote stories from the time I was a little girl, but I didn't want to be a writer. I wanted to be an actress. I didn't realise then that it's the same impulse. It's make-believe. It's performance."                                   —Joan Didion “I have written a memoir here and there, and that takes its own form of selfishness and courage.”                                         —Peter Carey "First person narrative, memoir in particular, is like jazz; largely about the player, about where he riffs and scats, and how and why ... As with jazz, the more specific and heartfelt the performance, the deeper and wider its impact. ... as writers of nonfiction in the first person, we get to play, to scat, to take the solo, to emphasize the elements that ring true for us, to slide past the ones that don't. A writer of memoir takes on personal history—that's her script, her score—and uses her voice to inform those remembered events and to make them her own. She's obligated to tell the truth, and she's obligated to tell it her way."                                 —Dinah Lenney Copyright © 2013 Beth Yahp, All rights reserved. Apologies for cross-posting, and please do let me know if you would like to be removed from this list. Also do let me know if you've been forwarded this email and would like to be added to the list of notifications about upcoming Memoir Club and other writing, teaching and touring events. Thanks.

Memoir Club for Readers & Writers  Beth Yahp WritingWorks: Author, Editor, Writing Teacher bethyahpwritingworks.blogspot.com Barbara Brooks http://bbwritinglife.blogspot.com.au/

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Memoir Club Meeting:                 Tuesday, 30 July 2013 Randwick Literary Institute RSVP by 27 July (please indicate whether or not you'd like some food) joanne burns talks about her work  and joanne in conversation with Barbara Brooks Renowned as an experimental poet and writer whose "seemingly contradictory hybrid of yarn and the vision" is "time and again made manifest through a rather laconic, sceptical and straight-talking voice", joanne burns joins the Memoir Club this month to discuss how memoir and autobiographical moments sometimes influence and infiltrate her writing. Her "distinctive stance towards the world" has been described as "humourous, unsentimental, never pompous or prophetic, immersed in fleeting experiences..." and her poems are said to illustrate "the idea of poems being built out of the detritus of existence". Can poems be considered a form of memoir? And, as Robert Frost claimed, can they "make you remember what you didn't know you knew"? joanne burns writes poetry (including prose poems), monologues, and short futurist fictions or farables. Since 1972 many collections of her work have been published, the most recent being 'footnotes of a hammock' (Five Islands Press, 2004), 'an illustrated history of dairies' (Giramondo, 2007) and 'amphora' (Giramondo, 2011). 'kept busy', a CD of joanne burns reading a selection of her work, was released in 2007 (River Road Publishing). She is currently working on assembling a Selected poems collection, and on a new poetry collection, 'brush'. The ironic, satiric, the ludic and absurd feature strongly in her work. Barbara Brooks is a Sydney writer, independent scholar and teacher of writing. She has published short stories, essays and a biography, Eleanor Dark: A Writer's Life. Her memoir Verandahs, which crosses into fiction, won the UTS Chancellors Award as an outstanding thesis.  About the Memoir Club: a meeting place for readers and writers  When: last Tuesday of every month (27 August, 24 September, 29 October, etc.)  Time: 6 - 8.30 PM (come help set up chairs etc. from 5.30pm if you can - more hands make lighter work! And at the end of the evening, help tidying up is much appreciated too...) Where: The Randwick Literary Institute, 60 Clovelly Road, Randwick NSW 2031 Tel: 02-9398 5203 (for directions and venue info). Street parking is available. Clovelly bus 339 on the doorstep. For how to get there, see: http://randwickliteraryinstitute.com.au/faqs/ What: A communal space to meet other writers and readers and converse about all things to do with reading and writing memoir. We are interested in all kinds of life stories and in different ways of telling them. The genre of life writing and the possibilities of expanding and reworking the genre is exciting to us. Therefore we have a somewhat open and inclusive approach to what makes a memoir, and we hope you do too! Here is a space to connect with others and share ideas, questions and just hang out. Each meeting will start off with a talk, conversation or discussion about a particular topic or book, sometimes with a guest speaker or facilitator, then we move to an informal gathering and catch up. Donation: $10 at the door for hall hire, refreshments and speakers. Food: $15 for a plate of delicious vegan finger food from Rosada's Kitchen (different each meeting). Future Speakers: Drusilla Modjeska (The Mountain), Mary Zournazi (on filmmaker Agnes Varda), Adam Aitken (Eighth Habitation) and Patti Miller (The Mind of a Thief) will join us at future sessions to talk about their memoirs or the memoir aspects of their work. RSVP: Please RSVP to Beth at bywritingworks@gmail.com for room and catering purposes Look forward to seeing you there! Please do pass information on to anyone who might be interested in this community gathering. Thanks and cheers, Beth

mem·oir   /ˈmemˌwär/ Noun A historical account or biography written from personal knowledge. An autobiography or a written account of one's memory of certain events or people. "cixous writes of her childhood experience of the story of jacob's ladder. how she was drawn to the images of descending angels. she writes of the dream ladder. going down. growing into the earth. the descent on the ladder of writing will be tough. down through the body of flesh and earth."                                  —joanne burns “Breathe in experience, breathe out poetry.”                                —Muriel Rukeyser "Robert Frost said that poetry can make you 'remember what you didn't know you knew'... In a way that is much more open-ended than prose writing, poetry destroys walls between private and public thoughts, between private and public emotions, between private and public motivations... You can truly describe personal events that may involve your familial readers with a power that is not necessarily stark, blunt, naked or offensive. A good poem is not always 'accurate' but just the same, is always 'true'."                                 —Carl G. Schott

I’ve just been reading what Margo Lanagan has to say about writing in Charlotte Wood’s interview with her. If you’re interested in interviews with writers, and I think it’s a great way to find out more about the process, Charlotte’s Writing Room interviews are fascinating reading. She’s interviewed Amanda Lohrey and David Roach and Margo so far. You can sign up for the series at her website at -  http://www.charlottewood.com.au/writersroom.html

I’ve been thinking about the writing process again because I’m getting ready for the my July short course, Kickstart your Writing. I’ve completed two BIG writing projects and learned a lot on the way. The Eleanor Dark biography, Eleanor Dark: a Writer's Life, was a major research project as well as an adventure in writing, and I worked with a  friend on the book, Judith Clark, through the research and interview stages, and then she read my drafts.  I had very good editors, Drusilla Modjeska wrote a report on the ms as a structural editor, and Carl Harrison-Ford came in at the end of the process. My Verandahs book was another big project, this time a memoir that crossed over into fiction. It started as a memoir of my English grandfather and his life in India. It's not published yet, but it will be on its way soon. I’ve been reading about creativity and process and I’m intrigued by the patterns that emerge across different art forms and different projects. For example, we've all experienced that lovely surge of energy and enthusiasm when we write a first draft of something new, usually followed by a bit of a crash, when we discover that what’s on the page is disappointing because it isn’t earth-shatteringly brilliant and exactly what we had in our heads. It’s a time when you might get despondent, give up, walk away from the desk. But it’s a stage in the process. It's the beginning. Artist Anne Truitt said, in her Daybook, the energy of beginning is different from the energy of continuing and completing.

The Kickstart your writing course is a short course, over two weekends in July, designed to help anyone who’s starting a project, or has one under way but has had a break, or run into problems, and wants to be re-inspired and energised. There will be a lot of presentations on different aspects of the writing process and the creative process. But I’m keeping it as practical and hands-on as I can, with short exercises focusing on getting you thinking and planning and writing, and you'll send an example of your writing for a workshop session at the second meeting.

More information about this class and my Masterclass at the Masterclass tab at the top of the page. The Masterclass is designed to guide you and help you make real progress with your writing project. There are 6 fortnightly meetings of four hours each over 3 months. There's time to focus on your work. It's  somewhere between a writing class and a mentoring experience, because of the small group and individual feedback.

My Writing, Creativity and Meditation course has been postponed until later in the year. I'm still keen to run this course. I've been reading about creativity and what writers and other creative workers have to say about their process and meditation often features. Earlier in the year I was on a panel at UTS talking to new post-graduate students about how to navigate through and complete a large project. Three of the other speakers mentioned meditation and how helpful it had been to them. Let me know if you'd like to be on my mailing list for this class.

Mud Map:

A first collection of experimental writing
by Australian women for the new century

edited by Moya Costello, Anna Gibbs, Barbara Brooks, Rosslyn Prosser

Publication Date: April 2013


a special issue of 

Text Magazine of Writing and Writing Courses

www.textjournal.com.au/speciss/issue17/content.htm

Here are some sessions at the Sydney Writers' Festival that might be either helpful or interesting.

There are some 'craft' sessions and some that sound useful from a craft point of view: Jackie Kay on May 25th, 180, How Imagination can help us survive; Framing a Life: on Memoir, 213 on May 26; Research and Writing 218 on May 26th, Deborah Levy on why she writes, 249 on May 26; A Character called Place, 217, on May 23; Ann Deveson in Writing Painful Experiences, 63, May 23; The Art and Ethics of Biography, 122, May 24.

The writers I'm interested include Kate Atkinson, Claire Messud, Pankaj Mishra who writes brilliantly about India, James Wood, the critic and reviewer.

And there's an evening at the Observatory with Ross Gibson, always a stimulating speaker, talking about his new book Starburst World, on William Dawes.

New classes and Memoir/Nonfiction Masterclass

I'm running two new short courses in June and July, as well as a Masterclass in Memoir and Nonfiction starting in August. The first of the short courses looks at meditation and creativity in relation to writing, and will give you some practical instructions - an introduction to meditation and ways to support your writing. The second class is something I've often been asked for: a short practical course designed to help you to get started on a new project or get back to an existing one, and make some progress.

For new information about my classes, and how to register, go to the Masterclasses and Mentoring tab at the top of the page.

I've been co-editing, with writer friends and colleagues Moya Costello, Anna Gibbs and Ros Prosser, a collection of short experimental prose and poetry by Australian women. It's coming out very soon as a special issue of an e-journal, Text, with the title Mud Map. I'll let you know when it's up - is that what you say with e-journals? when it's published? when it's in the ether, on the net?

Here's a poem for memoir writers.

Instructions for living a life. 
Pay attention. 
Be astonished. 
Tell about it.

Mary Oliver

And for those of you who came to the Memoir Club in March, I read a short extract from "Searching for Monty', from Verandahs. If you'd like to read more, you'll find it in Griffith Review 34, under fiction.

NB: If you didn't come to the Memoir Club and would like to be on our mailing list, email me at
bbwritinglife@gmail.com. The next meeting is Tuesday night 30 April. 

Two new short courses, and information about my masterclasses starting in August. For more detailed information about these classes, and how to register, go to the Masterclasses and Mentoring tab at the top. 

Writing, creativity and meditation

A writing course over 2 weekend afternoons 

Writing, like any creative practice, depends on vastly different activities and abilities – the ideas and inspiration to get started on a project, the imagination and creativity to bring it into being, and the discipline, energy and persistence to continue and complete. But there are times when it’s difficult to find the confidence to continue, and the clarity to see where to go. These are questions every writer struggles with at times. Even getting to the desk to start writing can be an issue. Write a little every day without hope and fear, Isaak Dinesen said. In this class over 2 Saturday afternoons we will use meditation exercises and writing exercises, readings and discussion to improve our understanding of the writing process and look at how meditation can be an aid to the writer.

Venue Newtown/Enmore area

Dates: Saturdays 8 and 15 June 2-6pm

Cost:  $300

As well as being an experienced writer and teacher of writing, who has taught writing in many different venues, Barbara Brooks has studied meditation in various disciplines.

Kickstart your writing 

or, how to inspire yourself and keep writing

A writing workshop over 2 weekend afternoons  

Whether you’re getting started on a new writing project, or getting going again after a break, you need the inspiration and energy to magic the ideas into words, to begin with, and then the  enthusiasm, patience, and discipline – and different kind of energy – to follow through. The Australian writer Marjorie Barnard wished for someone to encourage her, to stand behind her and say, Write, darling, write! In this workshop over two Saturday afternoons we’ll discuss some ideas about  how to inspire yourself and stimulate creativity, and strategies for keeping going through the different, and sometimes difficult, stages of working on a book or longer project. We’ll look at how to work with a draft, and revising and rewriting to completion.  There will be presentations by me, as well as readings, writing exercises, and discussion. And writing exercises to help you develop your project.  You will send some writing to me and the group before the second meeting, and get written editorial feedback from me as well as discussion of your work in a workshop session. 

Venue: Newtown/Enmore area

Dates: Saturdays 6 & 20 July  2pm-6pm  

Cost:  $300

Masterclasses in memoir and nonfiction 

You work with me in a small group with a strong focus on your writing. I'll present information on different topics, suggest writing strategies. You get readings, writing exercises, and written feedback from me as well as guided workshop discussion of your writing. My experience of teaching writing has convinced me this is what you need to develop your writing and make progress.  

Venue: Enmore
Dates: Saturdays 2-6.15pm starting 10 August
Cost: $750  

The Latest on Classes from BB WritingLife

Hi Everyone

Welcome to the BB WritingLife blog, which will tell you about my classes as well as referring you to some writing events, articles and websites you might find useful and interesting.

Masterclasses: my next Masterclasses in Memoir will start in August. More information soon.

New classes: I'm also running some short courses in May/June: one on how to inspire yourself and get started on your project, or, re-inspire your writing and get started again, called Kickstart Your Writing, and another called Writing and Meditation on how meditation may help you get started, get inspired and solve problems in your writing. These classes will run over two Saturdays, a fortnight apart. Details soon.

Other news: I've been editing, with Moya Costello, Anna Gibbs, and Rosslyn Prosser, a collection of short experimental writing by Australian women. This will published soon as a special issue of the e-journal Text, and I'll give you the details when it appears.