a simple blog about a writer's life

Jargon?

2012-01-12T11:19:00.000Z

I wrote a piece for Design Week a while back. It was about jargon in the creative industry. Terms like copy and iteration. I heard from quite a few people who agreed with my argument - that we need to make sure we only use this sort of language when we know a reader/listener will understand it ie most of the time, we should avoid it. But some people argued that these terms aren't jargon - they're industry terms.

It's a fair point. Sometimes, these terms aren't jargon. If two people who use them both understand them and know each other understands them, they're fine. As long as they don't start using them outside that environment. And as long as someone from outside that environment doesn't hear them. Because then they become jargon.

I read an article on SMEWEB earlier about the language of pensions:

'The research results also shows that more than half (57 per cent) say that sometimes pensions seem so complicated they can’t understand the best options available, while one in three people are putting off thinking about saving for retirement because they find pensions confusing.'

The article says this is down to 'jargon'.

And that's the problem with jargon. It excludes, it confuses, it can make people feel stupid. I bet the people writing pension information aren't going for hugely technical language. They're probably just using the terms they'd use with each other, inside the big pension factory, where all the pension people get together and talk about pensions.

But they shouldn't use those terms when they're talking to people outside that world. People like you and me. Because we don't understand them. We just want to know how to put money away for the future.

The Big European Travel Adventure...

2012-01-03T12:44:00.001Z

Two years ago, I'd just finished travelling around Britain by the light of the full moon. That idea came to me first in 2007, when I thought it'd be fun to do something a bit different. I didn't do anything about it at the time. Then a girlfriend dumped me and I ended up living back home with my parents and life stalled - so I made it happen.

Every full moon of 2009, I decided I'd hop in my car and travel to somewhere in Britain that had lunar connections, then throw myself into any situation I could.

During that year, I spent a lot of time researching places I didn't know and discovering fascinating facts about them. And at one point, I spotted something that gave me another idea that, one day, would give me another excuse to travel and do daft things. It was clearly a sign:

The idea was 'Twin Town'. The one day arrives in the spring.

In April, I'll throw off the shackles (and income) of work, hop in a car, cross the Channel, arrive in France and probably think Eek, this is a much bigger challenge than I imagined. Then I'll head to my first twinned town. I'll spend the next couple of months hopping between twins, asking questions, snooping around and getting into some sticky situations (that my mix of English and GCSE French will hopefully rescue me from).

What's a twin town? To people in Europe, it's a place twinned with another place, either in Europe or further afield. (If you're American, you'd call it a sister city.)

What does that mean and why does it happen?

I've got three months, from today, to do all the research I can about twinning. I want to know why it started, whose idea it was, how popular it is, who's involved, does it help and build relationships or has it run out of steam? Then, for a couple of months in the spring, I'm off to learn more first-hand.

But before that happens, I need your help.

Thank you
Sam, Caroline and Mark from Fabric, for the beautiful mark and typography (above) and helping make it work online.

If I had an out-of-office on...

2011-12-24T11:44:00.000Z

it would say:

I'm not at my desk for the next few days. I'm either on the floor opening presents, in the kitchen helping Mum cook, in the living room helping my two nieces celebrate their first Christmas, or up the river taking a breather.

If you need any extra entertainment, try 26 Stories of Christmas. You're in for a treat.

Enjoy a lovely Christmas filled with warmth, happiness and love.

See you in 2012.

Rob x

Implementing iterated copy to progress

2011-12-20T23:35:00.000Z

This week I had an article published on the Design Week blog. It's here.

And here:

Up to us

It’s simple. If the creative industry carries on speaking in jargon, jargon will win. It’ll seem natural. And we’ll never rid the business world of the sort of language that confuses, excludes and puts to sleep.

Jargon at work is a problem – everyone knows it and most admit it. Even the people who use it, when you point it out, recoil at the words they don’t even remember saying. But it’s everywhere – and it’ll be everywhere until we stop using it. Yes, we. We, the creative industry. It’s time to get our house in order.

Recently, I’ve been working in-house at a London design agency. The first thing they told me about the job they’d put me on was ‘We’ve been asked to get rid of the business speak and jargon’. Great, I thought – a business that wants to improve the way it communicates, and an agency that’s embracing that.

They showed me the client’s first stab at the magazine. Not bad – not as full of jargon as I’ve seen. But still a bit cold, distant, unnatural and formal. All because of the words, structure of sentences, pace and tone the writer had gone with.

After a couple of days of reading, tweaking here and rewriting there, I sent off a new version of some of the magazine. Feedback came in halfway through the week, some from the client and some from the agency. We went through everything and the person at the agency managing the job told me to implement the changes.

Five minutes later, a project manager across the studio told colleagues she wouldn’t progress an intern’s application. Then someone else told colleagues to apply some iterations, and two designers asked for new copy.

Implement, to progress, iterations, copy. This jargon is tame. No value propositions, no pipelines. But the people speaking these words – actually speaking them – should know better.

But this isn’t an angry rant about businesses hiding behind business speak. This is about the opportunity we all have across the creativity industry to promote the use of clear, honest, entertaining, engaging, persuasive, natural language. The language that’s best for the consumer, the job and the brand. We need to show businesses the power of language by making the right decisions ourselves.

For many people, business speak has become the default. That’s a bit of laziness and a bit of not realising what they’re saying or writing. If we take more time, more care and pay more attention to the way we communicate with other people, we won’t ask them to implement changes, we’ll ask them to change something. We’ll move an application to the next stage, change the design till it’s working, and try some new words. We’ll avoid the abstract and start saying what we actually mean.

That’s scary to many people. You can’t hide behind clear and honest language – it tells the truth. So you need to be sure about what you’re saying and confident when you say it.

My job isn’t to moan about ‘bad’ English, poor grammar or to persuade businesses to write ‘properly’. It’s to find opportunities for people in business to communicate more clearly. And here’s an opportunity right now. We – writers, designers, brand consultants, marketers, and anyone else who’s employed by businesses to help them connect with people – can change the way people in business write and speak.

But first we need to keep an eye on what we’re saying to each other and the businesses we’re trying to help.

The story of Christmas

2011-12-05T17:42:00.000Z

At the very end of August this year, designer person man thing Sam Gray emailed me from faraway Plymouth with the beginning of an idea. He wrote in his email:

Why don’t we, in true 26 [the writers' group] style, invite people to do something for Christmas? It just so happens that the first 26 days of December take us right up to boxing day :) See where this is going?

26 Days of Christmas — an online, interactive site with 26 pieces of writing, released from behind a window (or similar) on the right day. It’s a fun project, simple, easy and involves a lot of people from 26...

What do you think?

I replied seven minutes later:

BLOODY BRILLIANT.

Love that.

...

Just thought about it again.

LOVE IT. Yes. YES.

What a treat - each day to get a new story.

Maybe with an illustration. So like an advent calendar - the words are the chocolates, then on the back of the window you get an illustration. Or something visual that fits the writing...

Lovely.

So Sam wrote:

That’s it!

Words and pictures for each and every day leading up to Christmas!

So, what’s next?

Next came three months of heads down, emails around the world, asking favours, challenging creative people, writing proposals and briefs, asking more favours, cajoling people, going to meetings, reading stories, editing stories, looking at illustrations, offering feedback, designing a brand, creating a website, writing that website, hosting get-togethers, many many 2am finishes, weekends laptopping.

Next came www.26storiesofchristmas.com. There you'll find a story a day till Boxing Day.

We hope they keep you warm on these chilly days.

Festive wishes

* * *

Well done, Sam. Great idea and so much hard work put in to make it happen. And thanks to Mark, Anna, Rowena and Sarah - without you, we wouldn't be sharing the warmth.

Scary, exciting, challenging

2011-11-22T11:14:00.000Z

A couple of months ago, a friend asked me to write a short story for his collection. Beautiful surprise. Usually it's me doing the asking.

Then, for about a month, I worried because I didn't have any ideas. I kicked through fallen leaves trying to uncover one. I listened to new music for one to shout itself to me. I even travelled to Switzerland with a notepad ready to house the Big Idea. But no. Nothing. The brief was good, fun, challenging. But I just couldn't respond.

The collection will focus on Time. Writers and other creative folk from around the country are writing stories, articles, illustrating and otherwise contributing to it. Each of us will create around the idea of time and time travel. Not necessarily science fiction, the editor told me. But time. What does it mean?

I couldn't get science fiction from my mind. And then travel. Until two weeks ago, when I listened to Jeremy Vine's lunchtime show on Radio 2. It was the week of Remembrance Day and Jeremy was speaking to mums who've lost sons to war. I stepped away from work and writing and enjoyed the softness, purity, heart, passion and love of the words spoken by these women. Each day, another mum chose a playlist: her son's favourite songs (the sorts that often led to Mum banging on the door, shouting, 'Turn it down').

The day I listened, a mum from Leeds said about the son she lost in Iraq:

"I'll see him again cos time goes on, don't it?"

There's the spark. That line. It's full of its own story and it's a story I think needs telling. It came when I wasn't looking for it - like all the best ideas.

I have just under two weeks to get it onto paper.

Christmas comes early

2011-11-16T18:37:00.001Z

On Monday, I gathered with around 20 writers and illustrators to kick off the second stage of a project I'm running with my distant design partner, Sam Gray (he lives in Plymouth, I live in London). The writers were from the writers' organisation 26, and the illustrators from the London College of Communications. Most of the writers who came earn their living from writing for businesses, while the illustrators were students on their work-placement year.

26 Stories of Christmas is the latest in a magical line of 26 projects - some of which I've admired from a distance, some I've written for, and some I've helped run. This one came from Sam's mind - and it's a gem.

We asked 26 writers to choose an object that means Christmas to them. Then we mixed up the writers and their objects, pairing each writer with another's object. The challenge was for writers to write a 500-word piece of family fiction (the sort of story you might read to everyone, from grandkids to grandfolks, after Christmas dinner). Nobody knows who's been paired with their precious object. No-one, except the team behind the project, knows what the writers have come up with.

Objects ranged from an oilrigger's jacket to a wood fire, while stories feature heartbroken batteries, talking riddles, poignant pocketwatches, a colourful series of events in a pub and much more. Some made us laugh, some made us cry - they all made us long for Christmas.

We'll share stories one a day from 1st to 26th December. But there's more. At Monday's get-together at the everso Christmassy ice rink outside the Natural History Museum in London's South Kensington, we paired some of our professional writers with LCC illustrators. The students now have two weeks to respond to their writer's story visually. That might be through graphics, photography, typography or good old-fashioned sketches and illustrations. Other illustrators around the country are doing the same.

The briefs are open to creative interpretation. The deadlines are tight.

On December 1st, you'll be able to pop along to 26storiesofchristmas.com and enjoy the first of 26 festive tales. You'll also have the chance to sign up to our iPad app, which will deliver a story a day to your iPad.

26 Stories of Christmas is proof again that wondrous things can happen when you bring people together.

Ideas are power

2011-10-17T10:14:00.001+01:00

A year and ten months ago, I had an idea. Wouldn't it be great to give voices to works of art in stuffy museums? Help them speak to the person on the street (who otherwise might not pop in to look around)?

A week later, I'd pitched the idea to John Simmons, a founding member of the writers' organisation 26. A month after that, the London Design Festival had jumped on board. Then the V&A in London's South Kensington.

By September 2010, we were exhibiting 26 62-word written responses beside unique objects from the British Galleries inside one of the world's most popular museums, as part of one of the world's most respected design festivals.

We'd reached dizzyingly beautiful heights. So where next?

Last Friday, I flew to Belfast for the launch of 26 Treasures Northern Ireland. This time, instead of being the man with the idea, I was a guest. Invited but not celebrated. Just the way it should be.

This time the plaudits went to Gillian Colhoun, a good friend I made somewhere in Northumberland National Park at a Dark Angels writing course. The Park was an inspirational place - and Gillian an inspirational woman.

Since we asked for her help early in 2011, Gillian's created and curated 26 Treasures Northern Ireland with grace, grit, enthusiasm and a smile. She's taken the spirit of 26 and 26 Treasures. And she's blown me and John away.

The idea for 26 Treasures came one dull afternoon to a bored man sitting in an armchair in his parents' house in Essex. He called himself a freelance writer where 'unemployed' may have been closer to the truth.

Almost two years, lots of hard work, many friendships and a lot of sweat and smiles later, 26 Treasures has changed lives across the UK - at the V&A, the Ulster Museum, National Library of Wales and National Museum of Scotland (that launches in early December).

Believe it. One idea can change the world. By having even the smallest effect on the lives of people involved in it.

Just try it

2011-10-10T17:08:00.000+01:00

Two years ago I left an agency and became a freelance writer. Two years ago, I didn't have a clue what I was doing - just why I was doing it (I'd got bored in an office, doing the same thing every day). Two years on, I'm working on new and interesting projects all the time. I know what I'm doing. And I remembered that on Saturday, while giving a presentation. And it scared me a bit.

I, alongside a few other members of 26, shared stories and advice or gave workshops to other members of the group - and to some who'd never heard of us before but liked the idea of Wordstock.

We came up with Wordstock - the name and concept - in a 26 Board meeting a few months ago. After three years of very successful annual speeches, we decided it was time for a change. We'd got bored of the same thing. We needed a new challenge.

Wordstock, we decided, would be a word festival - a gathering of around 60 creative people (mostly writers) who'd wade deep into words and scribble and chat feverishly, drugged full of festival spirit.

This is me. Tom Lynham took the photo.

At the festival, I spoke about 26 Flavours of Cornwall with Tom Scott, the man who came up with the idea for this beautiful exhibition that's been touring Cornwall for the last few months. I worked with Tom for a year to help make it happen. Telling the stories now made us realise just how much we'd done, how many people we'd spoken to, how many teas, coffees and beers we'd drunk. And how it'd all started.

I moved to Cornwall this time last year because I got bored of London life. Now I'm back in London - eager to experience it until it's bored with me - because I got itchy feet in Cornwall.

Itchy feet led me to San Jose (California) to study for a semester after just a year at university in Surrey.

They took me up the east coast of Australia, too.

They persuaded me to pitch 26 Treasures to 26 back in 2010.

And to start a theatre company in the middle of my MA.

And walk around Britain by the light of the full moon.

There's a pattern emerging. Doing the same thing every day isn't great for my imagination. It starts to bleed my creativity. Fanciful ideas pop into my head - they tell me to try stuff. Go on, try it. What's the worst that'll happen?

On Saturday, I looked back a year and saw me in Cornwall, working with and learning from Tom, setting up events, pitching ideas to Eden and Trebah. I got scared because that's now all done. But today I'm sitting at my desk, dreaming about all the possibilities out there. And I'm looking forward to every one.

Someone who came to our presentation on Saturday asked me how you start one of these sorts of projects - a 26 Treasures, a 26 Flavours of Cornwall...

I smiled, looking back, looking forwards.

'Just try it. What's the worst that'll happen?'

Hop

2011-09-27T12:32:00.000+01:00

Freelance writing is an odd career.

Some days it's a dream. Actually a dream, my dream. The dream I had when I was 15 and a teacher told me I'd written a good story and my mind told me I should be a writer. But some days it's not a dream. It's not a nightmare either. Just some days the words don't come, because the ideas don't spark them, because the stories aren't there, because the experiences haven't happened.

I've never been busier. For six months, I've been speaking to businesses and agencies every day. They've been offering me big projects and small projects with big brands and small brands. I've written a handful of voice and personality guides, tens of internal communications documents, lots of reports, quite a few websites, Facebook blurbs, event invitations and much more.

But machines aren't creative. They don't have the experiences that bring the stories that spark the ideas that influence the words. It's up to humans to be creative - to embrace our imaginations and dream.

Creative people need to let life do strange and interesting things to them. Not just let but encourage. I've learned that in my two years of freelancing. Surround yourself with interesting people and challenging situations. Hop from your comfort zone. Speak to that drunk man who wants your money and ask him where he's from. Say yes to that invitation to a stranger's house. Fly across the world on a whim. And smile, knowing you can hop back when you need to.

Freelance writing is an odd career. Some days it's a dream.

Today it's given me time to think.

Clare Howdle and Parabola (guest post)

2011-08-23T13:56:00.000+01:00

Someone's asked me to write a short story for a creative writing collection. That hasn't happened in years. I've written stories for friends. And the occasional tale for myself. But it's lovely to have someone else ask me. This one - which I've nearly finished - is for Clare Howdle's Parabola Project. Here's a bit more about the collection...

In our current economic climate, adventures in independent publishing are more than a little thin on the ground, so what a pleasure to come across The Parabola Project, 80 pages of style and substance, marrying the captivating words of contemporary creative writing talent with eye-popping images and illustrations.

Packed with stories, novel extracts, poetry and prose from 11 wordsmiths, the principle behind Parabola is one of an ever-growing upwards curve – a publication which motivates, inspires and cultivates the creative writing community by showcasing some of its brightest luminaries and freshest blood, side by side.

Published in November 2010, The Parabola Project Issue I: Origins has gone down a storm with readers and critics alike, collecting awards for its design, acclaim for its writing and appreciation for its attempts to provide an outlet for writers at a time when getting words printed onto paper is becoming increasingly difficult.

The success of The Parabola Project Issue I has not only left the team behind it hungry for more – it’s grown their appetite. With Issue II of Parabola come plans to double the pagination, bump up the featured writers, draw in more illustrators and photographers, print twice as many copies to meet demand and distribute even further afield.

“Parabola is all about driving the creative scene forward and the response to our first issue was so positive we really want to build on that and take things to the next level,” explains Clare, editor and publisher of The Parabola Project and founder of writing group Telltales, from which Parabola has grown.

“It’s a real passion project so every penny from every copy of Issue I sold has gone back into the pot for issue II, but if we want to make it bigger and better, we need more. That’s where our Wefund campaign comes in.”

Thinking outside the box, Parabola has launched a crowdfunding campaign with leading website www.wefund.com to raise £2000 which will boost their production budget and enable them to make Issue II superlative. The campaign runs until the end of October and anyone can log on to Parabola’s profile, watch their film and pledge their support in return for incentives – from VIP launch invites to bespoke posters and illustrations.

“We really hope members of the public, industry professionals, arts organisations and anyone with an interest in the growth of the UK’s creative scene gets behind us,” Clare concludes. “We know there is a wealth of writing and illustration talent out there and we want to take it to new audiences and really show what our creative scene is capable of.”

To find out more about The Parabola Project and to help get a bigger, better Issue II to print, log on to http://www.wefund.com/project/help-get-parabola-project-issue-ii-print

To follow the progress of The Parabola Project: Issue II log onto www.wordslikepictures.com/telltales where Clare and the team will be posting weekly video blogs to give a insight of the publishing process.

Parabola Project Issue I: Origins is available for £4 plus postage and packing from www.parabolaproject.com

It's fab!

2011-08-09T20:17:00.000+01:00

Rick Stein has spoken.

26 Flavours of Cornwall, now on show at The Poly in Falmouth, is, I quote, 'fab'.

'I really like it,' said Rick, turning to me and smiling as I showed him around the exhibition on Tuesday.

Rick was at The Poly for a cookery demonstration. He thought it’d be a great opportunity to raise the profile of The Poly – Falmouth’s Royal Polytechnic Society in the heart of the high street – and raise some money for it, too.

It just happened 26 Flavours of Cornwall was hanging in the room above the demonstration. So I couldn’t resist inviting myself to drinks with the trustees before the demo. Or, I should say, asking The Poly’s very friendly, hugely enthusiastic general manager Ciaran if I could please pop along to show Rick around the exhibition.

'Of course,' said Ciaran.

There was no stopping Rick as he headed off to admire the 26 pieces of art hanging in The Poly’s exhibition space at the top of the stairs. He asked about 26. He smiled at the fudge and the Giant Mermaid Knockers, wondered at the wine, followed hog’s pudding's story, spoke to Jo Thomas about beer and chatted apples with Helen Gilchrist. Jo and Helen are trustees of The Poly. And keen members of 26.

After ten minutes of reading the 26 pieces – each a creative response to a Cornish food or drink from a team of writer and visual artist – Rick nipped off to prepare for his demo.

I wonder if he used any of our Flavours…

The exhibition stays up at The Poly until 14th August. It moves to the Lander Gallery in Truro in September for the Cornwall Food & Drink Festival.

Y'alright?

2011-08-04T14:06:00.001+01:00

Last night I listened to the excellent 'Fry's English Delight', a Radio 4 programme about language and linguistics presented by that champion of all things wordy, Stephen Fry.

During this final part of the series (which you can listen to here if you're quick), Fry discusses language and class. Do we, the English, still judge people on the way they speak?

There's a short part about U and non-U - the old language of the upper class (U), and the old language of the middle class (non-U). 'There was a very famous list of word variants,' says Fry. 'One was very U, or "upper", the other not the kind of things the upper classes would use at all - very "non-U".'

So if you were upper class, you were more likely to use a table napkin than serviette, wear glasses than spectacles, and visit the lavatory than toilet. Something else that would mark you out as non-U was an incorrect response to 'How do you do?' Say 'Pleased to meet you' and you were clearly a class or two below. The correct response, of course, was 'How do you do?' A simple repetition of the question.

And that got me thinking about my Australian friend, Sally. Walking along the Regent's Canal a few weeks ago, enjoying the Shoreditch Festival, a man walked past and said 'Y'alright?' I smiled, nodded and responded, 'Y'alright?' - just repeating his question. But Sal didn't. She made the mistake of feeling engaged in conversation and said, 'Good, thanks. How are you?'

I tried to explain that 'Y'alright' doesn't need an answer. Not in east London or Essex, at least. It's more a friendly nod, a raise of the eyebrows, a smile.

I found this when I was living in San Jose, California, five years ago. Often I'd smile and say 'Y'alright?' as I passed fellow students at university. They'd stop and say, 'Really good, thanks. How are you?' The number of people I ignored and backed away from because I couldn't think what to say next. This still happens to me sometimes in Cornwall.

If someone asked me how do I do, I'd tell them I was fine. And I'd thank them. They'd then know I wasn't upper class. If I then said 'Y'alright?' and they told me whether they were all right or not, I'd know they weren't from east London or Essex. Maybe not from the south east at all.

So, yes, class still plays a part in our language. But so does geography and environment and upbringing and education and aspiration and so much more. That's why language has always and will always fascinate me. That's why it's such a delight.

A change of pace

2011-07-24T19:48:00.000+01:00

Sometimes life stops you in your tracks.

That's what happened to me a few days ago. As my final wisdom tooth millimetred itself further into my mouth, joining its three siblings in saliva heaven, I stopped. I sat in pain. Reluctantly, I cancelled plans to read at the Port Eliot Festival. And I found time to think.

A few days into the pain and I'm still thinking.

This Tuesday is the final day of 26 Flavours at Trebah Garden in Cornwall. Over the last 24 days, visitors from around the country have enjoyed 26 reflections on local food and drink from writers and designers working in collaboration. Tom Scott, one of my old lecturers at Falmouth University, first mooted the idea last summer. When I heard about it in a 26 Board meeting a few weeks later, I said we had to make sure it happened. It took over nine months of hard work to launch it. Now it's about to finish.

But not finish altogether. About a month ago I spoke to a man called Ciaran from The Poly in Falmouth. He loved 26 Flavours - thought Tom's idea was beautiful and inspired. He offered exhibition space at The Poly for Falmouth Week, from 6th to 14th August. I said yes. So if you haven't seen the exhibition at Trebah over the last few weeks, come to The Poly for Falmouth Week. Rick Stein will be there, too.

As the painkillers kicked in and my head began to feel like a helium balloon, the rush of work and travel, the stress of missing festivals and letting people down, the accumulated stories of Germany, Ventenac and New York began to dissipate. A sense of nothing replaced them all. And it was good.

Over the last few days, I've felt Cornwall in my system. And, with just a few weeks left living in my favourite county in the UK, I've remembered why I love it here. Yes, clifftop walks are breathtaking. Yep, pasties, cream teas and the occasional pint of Betty Stogs and Cornish Knocker always go down well. Indeed, the people are warm and friendly and always up for a laugh. But it's something about the way of living down here that does it for me.

Stresses seem less stressful. Time seems to last a long time. Smiles arrive on other people's faces before they even realise it. For a year, that's been what I've needed. But it's nearly time to change pace again.

Next stop's London. A completely different place to Cornwall. But - after I enjoyed spoken word, African music and seeing old work friends there last week, and with a promise of open-air cinema, galleries and museums this weekend - somewhere equally interesting. Somewhere full of stories, experiences and stuff I don't even know about yet.

It'll be another chance of pace. But one I'm very ready for.

The 14th Tale

2011-07-17T11:11:00.000+01:00

Inua Ellams is one of the best storytellers I know.

Last night, I sat among 50 people at the Almeida Theatre in Islington to see him take us through his life, for the final night of Theatre Brothel. From the time he made friends with the new Chinese boy at school because he noticed they both enjoyed the same spine-tingle after weeing up a wall, to the day he found out his dad was numb down one side of his body because of a stroke, our storyteller took us on a journey. From Nigeria to London. From being a boy to becoming a man.

He'd chosen every word carefully. And every pause. And every heavy breath, every rhyme, every look, every gesture, every thing. To encourage us to think, and understand who Inua Ellams is today.

He was aware of his audience. He didn't know us, but he knew enough about us to know when we needed a pause, when we needed another line, or when we needed the next slice of his life.

And that's why I enjoyed it so much. Because I felt like he was talking to me. Like we'd just popped to the pub and he wanted to share some personal stories. Like I was the only friend he trusted with this information. I bet everyone else in the audience had the same feeling.

'I'm from a long line of troublemakers,' the 14th Tale starts.

And a long line of storytellers, too, I'd guess.

Crisitunity

2011-07-09T17:50:00.001+01:00

I’ve learned a lot from The Simpsons over the years. It’s made me smile, laugh, think and, I’m sure I remember once, cry. The writing is superb. The characters are almost real. So I wasn’t surprised last week when the following conversation between Homer Simpson and his daughter Lisa jumped into my head:

Lisa
The Chinese use the same word for crisis and opportunity.

Homer
Yes. Crisitunity!

Lots happened last week that made me step back and think about who I am and what I’m doing. I can’t call any of it a crisis. But I certainly started looking for new opportunities.

After eight months of planning and working and working and working, we launched 26 Flavours on 1st July to over a hundred special guests at Trebah Garden in Cornwall. And all of a sudden it stopped taking up huge amounts of my thinking space.

I felt so proud that I’d been part of the team that’d put together this celebration of food, drink and creativity. But I also felt completely empty. I always feel like that at the end of big, fun projects that bring so many people together. Incredibly happy that it’s gone from an idea into something real and popular. But sad the experience is over, the process done. So much hard work and happiness locked away now in memory.

Then a friend who’d become so much more in the last six months left on a train never to return. Again, months of experience came to an end. Shared stories are now finding their place beside 26 Flavours in my brain.

And I started thinking about all the things I’ve been doing lately. The year in Cornwall. The long weekend in Germany. The week in France. The nine days in New York. Stories started to bash into each other. Names disappeared. Faces smudged. And looking back I didn’t see the huge positives that I experienced during every part of every adventure.

So today I’ve stopped moving and started writing. Properly writing – with thought behind every word. ‘We write to make sense of the world around us,’ the wonderful Jamie Jauncey told me in France. So true. I’d never realised before, but everything I write puts things I see and read into my voice, informs them with my thoughts.

So 26 Flavours is over. Well no, it’s not. It continues at Trebah until 26th July. Then it moves to The Poly in Falmouth. Then to Truro, and other places. More than that though. The project connected me to so many clever, talented and interesting people. Over the last few months I’ve shared working and social time with them. And many I can now call friends.

That’ll happen with the next 26 project I’m involved in (this one’s even bigger). Which means no project is ever really over. And thinking like that makes me happy and excited by the future.

So the friend’s gone. No she hasn’t. She’s just living her life without me now – and I’m sure creating new experiences, enjoying new things, finding happiness in fantastically fun new ways. The memories we share are good. Very good. And they’ll creep into our conscious minds every now and then just to remind us that good experiences can only create good memories.

And those good experiences have inspired me try more of everything – to dig into Life with a big spoon and see what comes out.

And all the merging experiences? I think that’s a sign that I need to find a bit of focus. My year in Cornwall is nearly over – it’s been beautiful and hard, social and full of work, exciting and very very worth it. The weekend in Germany was fun and educational. And a good taste of what’s to come with my travels next year. France gave me time to walk, think, write and drink a lot of wine. New York blew my mind to pieces, then started to put it back together. But in a new and exciting order.

Right now I’ve got a month left to enjoy Cornish summer and watch 26 Flavours grow and grow. So that’s my focus. And by focusing I’m sure I’ll find lots of new opportunities.

Voice of Californian sun

2011-07-05T23:34:00.000+01:00

I've been touch-screening through my phone over the last few days, sorting photos, videos, texts, emails. And I came across Notepad. Since last September, I've been adding little stories to it, and poems, straplines, random thoughts, ideas for projects. And more.

Here's something I wrote after seeing Joshua Idehen perform his spoken word piece 'My Love' at Roehampton University in January, when we both returned as alumni to speak to current writing students.

This is about Professor Samuel Maio, a wonderful man who taught me about writing, literature and life at San Jose State University in 2005. And inspired me to try.

Where to start? Where do you start in telling stories of Professor Maio? He's a man I knew for a few months. But in that time, in rhyme, in lines, this man inspired me. Through Poe I remember most vividly, creeping ahead of the class, back hunched and voice lowered and breathy telling us the story of the house of Usher. We watched with eyes glued, nowhere to hide. In that time his mind turned my mind into a storytelling machine. Cleaner than it'd ever been. Leaner. Leaner than a bit of beef that's dropped from George Forman's lean mean grilling machine. Professor Maio inspired. Stood up, asked questions. He fired me to write like my writing life depended on every word working. Every line counting. Counted the metre under his voice. Just enough to show that he was into it - living each word, each pause, each verse, each clause, getting to know each character... You can rhyme, Robert, he'd say in his sun-setting-between-the-Californian-hills way. And he was right. He inspired us all, every time we sat in the line of his eyes and smiled.

Jack's world

2011-06-24T16:27:00.001+01:00

I wrote the piece below over a week ago. I wasn't going to post it because I don't want to upset the man who features in it. I have a lot of respect for him. But I spoke to a friend who said I should post it because this man is fascinating. And his story should be told.

So here it is (his name changed):

* * *

Yesterday, on a flight to New York, I sat next to a man called Jack.

Jack is an adventurer. There’s nowhere in the world he hasn’t been. And no woman he hasn’t slept with.

I sat in awe of this man for the first seven hours of the flight. He told me about the time he drove through Africa (through Turkey, Syria, down to Ethiopia, then further, further). And how he leads adventure groups through North America. And how, this summer, he’ll backpack through central America. And next year drive from Europe to Asia.

He’s been arrested and locked up in Zimbabwe for letting one of his tour groups photograph Mugabe’s mansion (‘We thought it was a golf club’). And they’ve shot at him across Africa.

Jack’s a rugged man – a mix between Jason Statham and Daniel Craig. The sort of man you look at and think, Women must love you. And, from the stories he told, they do. Never bragging, Jack told me about his girlfriend in London. She’s beautiful, exotic. They get on so well. And his girlfriend in New York. A millionaire, and again beautiful. And his girlfriend in Columbia. Fiery woman.

They all know each other exists. And they’ve all tried to get Jack to settle – offered him their lives, their bodies, their homes.

But Jack’s addicted to travel. Ever since leaving Croydon and joining an 18-30s group, he’s challenged himself. He climbs mountains, kite surfs, bungee jumps. He even became an air steward for Virgin so he could see the world, and share hotels with 18 beautiful women (and gay men – ‘Mum just thinks I’m gay,’ he told me, half-smiling).

So for seven hours I heard his stories and thought, Wow, I wish I could do that. It sounded perfect. Here, opposite me, sat the opposite of me: a man who didn’t plan life (just let it happen), who committed to no-one, who doesn’t own a mobile phone, never checks email, sleeps with anyone for the experience (unless they’re in a relationship).

‘Never going to settle then?’ I asked as we were landing.

His handsome grin dropped. ‘Everyone asks me that.’ But he still had to think about his response. ‘I don’t know. I doubt it. Though I’m turning 40 in a month and…’ For the first time he looked in my eyes for longer than a second. ‘My friends have all settled, they’re married, got children.’

He didn’t have to say what he couldn’t say. His eyes had told me.

Knob Creek

2011-06-21T04:23:00.004+01:00

I'm just back from a night alone in Brooklyn. Almost entirely alone. Too alone for the sort of thing I just did.

Tonight was storytelling night at People's Republic of Brooklyn, just over the road from where I'm staying. I hadn't heard of storytelling as a thing until earlier this week, when my good friend Sally told me how popular it is in Melbourne. 'People stand up and share personal stories. Loads of people go,' she said.

So I imagined it like a poetry slam - a night of spoken word and poetry that's so popular with New Yorkers (it can attract thousands).

Storytelling at People's Republic of Brooklyn isn't quite like that.

The bar is dark and run by people who don't seem convinced they can do the job they're doing. I turned up at the end of quiz night. Quiz night is supposed to flow smoothly into storytelling, Stan told me. 'Stan's the king of storytelling,' the smiley girl behind the bar said, unconvincingly. Stan smiled coyly and brushed her away with his limp hand.

Stan and I chatted. He told me about some of the 19 times he's performed at the bar. About some of the stories: about his headmaster who hated him, growing up in the deep south, moving to New York 23 years ago, America's approach to sex.

'So what story are you telling tonight?' I asked.

'Ooh, just a little something I've been working on. An old story,' he said in a gruff accent, New York with a Louisiana chaser. 'It's um-' he smiled. 'Quite... Well, you'll see.'

He asked me to film him, because his housemates hadn't turned up. Looking around, I noticed nobody in New York had turned up. Lots of quiz people had left. But no-one had replaced them. I would've felt gutted if I'd had to speak. I felt glad I didn't.

'You telling us a story?' asked the big man with all the muscles and full shirt behind the bar.

'Yes,' I said, instantly, not wanting to upset him. 'Yes. Please.'

Stan sat a few stools down and began to tell his story, while I set up his camera and filmed.

'Dogs have sex.'

It had started quite um...

'Y'know, dogs and sex. Doggy sex. Sex. Dogs. Dog sex.'

Stan kept his recital at this level for quite a while, allowing us (me) to come to terms with his theme. Which I was starting to think was dogs and sex.

His story did move on. It was all about the first time he watched two dogs having sex. He ran to his dad to tell his dad that one dog was hurting another. His dad and his dad's friends laughed at him. They were having dog sex (the dogs, not his dad and his dad's friends).

I clapped Stan for what he told. Because it wasn't easy for him. The chef was chatting to the bar lady (at New York levels), drinkers in the garden were wandering by, and there were only three people in the audience. And three of those were finishing drinks after the quiz rather than watching Stan tell his dog-sex story.

So Stan had paved the way for me.

I'd decided to tell the audience (Stan) about Moonwalking - my year of travelling around Britain by the full moon. I asked the audience (Stan) if they'd ever been to England or Scotland or Wales. They said No.

I launched in. Stories of fell walking, hiking, investigators of the paranormal, moonrise, Luandon, nearly falling into big holes in the Lake District spilled from me. There were a couple of titters in the audience (from Stan) and smiles (Stan's). And I got a round of applause at the end.

But it wasn't quite as I'd expected.

After shaking Stan's hand and wishing him luck in future (he was devastated that he'd forgotten a line - something about dogs and sex, I guessed), I walked home. I heard a giggle. It was from me. Then I remembered something. Something very special about the evening. Something about storytelling at People's Republic of Brooklyn that'll stick in my mind for a long long time.

Knob Creek. A nasty condition that you can clear up with a little oil.

I love stories.

New York in a word

2011-06-17T15:04:00.000+01:00

I write for a living. So I should be good with words.

But this week, I've been struggling to come up with the right word to describe New York City. The famous song tells us it's so good they named it twice. But I don't think 'good' does all it needs to do.

New York is a hotchpotch of people, life and experience. It's a coming together of cultures. It's a new smell on every corner, a different language in every store, a spitting man there, a screaming woman there, a man in drag on a bike, a pigeon with attitude, a grifter, a one dollar ice-cold water, a posing woman who thinks she's famous. It's suffocating heat and beautiful aircon.

It's without identity. And it changes every day I enter it.

Take yesterday. I walked from Brooklyn to Manhattan through downtown Brooklyn and across Brooklyn Bridge. Tourist heaven. There are three types of people on the bridge: local joggers, local cyclists and tourists with DSLRs. Thirty-degree heat baked us all.

In the afternoon, I visited Ellis Island to look around the immigration museum. And what a fantastic experience that was. Still tourists flocked. But away from the heart of Manhattan, life had calmed a little. Still tourists snapped photographs - mainly of the Statue of Liberty from the boat, or from a quick stop on Liberty Island. But away from Manhattan, a world with no horizon, the pace was less furious.

Take the day before. I met with two friends, one from London, the other from Bournemouth, before seeing my friend from Australia, who I'd later introduce to my friends from Brooklyn, one of whom is originally from Plymouth, Devon. With Ed and Olly I walked around Central Park. And found peace. With Sally, Simon and Eric, I spent the evening in an old warehouse in Chelsea that's become a theatre-set hotel for an interactive play.

That was the night after the burlesque night that Sally and I thought would be poetry.

Nothing's what it seems. Hell's Kitchen isn't hell. That Irish man doesn't really want to know where you're from (he just wants your money).

New York is money. Buy a drink and you need to tip a dollar. Buy food and you have to tip at least 15%. Take a photo of that fun thing and they'll charge you for it. Get chatting to the man who plays soccer and supports Manchester and you'll end up paying $5 for some sickly sweets.

It's a place of dreams and nightmares. Those who came here packed in ships from across Europe in the early 20th century were tested like animals before immigration officers let them start a life in New York City. They broiled them silly. Not just Why are you here? But Where are you going? What's two plus one? What diseases do you have? Are you moving in with friends? (What will you give to the city?)

I think if you give your life to New York City, you get something back: a lifetime of living on the edge, by your wits, either in sweaty, busy, hard luxury, or sweaty, busy, hard squalor.

New York City is fast. And vast. It's the city that never ends. Broadway is over 13 miles long. That's half a marathon. The subway makes the city seem manageable - one hour you're in Brooklyn, the next you're in Queens - but the subway also knocks your sense of direction, your compass.

This article is a mess because New York City is a mess. But New York City works. Somehow, with its 8 million people, its skyscapers, its heat, its languages, its festivals, its theatre, its pace, its anger, its confidence, its friendliness, and everything else, it works.

It's half a millennium of stories, 468.9 square miles of land and water. It's a sandwich of experience with neverending layers. It's a book without a last page.

Today I'm going up to the top of the Rock. Then for a drink on the top of a skyscraper. Then to a bar opening in Queens. Then tomorrow there's a mermaid parade. And a birthday party in Brooklyn. Then Sunday there's comedy.

I still don't have a word for New York City. So far just this poem:

Cider Haze
Cider haze at 3.34am
On a train I barely know
No-one knows where I am
I'm a stranger alone
Cider haze at 3.34am
On a train I barely know
Latino, Spaniard, New Yorker
But no-one that I know

I'll keep looking for the word. I'll let you know if I find it.

La mer ou saucisson

2011-06-08T14:44:00.000+01:00

My French isn't very good. So a week in the south of France is a healthy challenge for me.

This morning I strolled along the canal du midi for a couple of hours until I reached a bridge. Where there were no trees, there were ducks. Where there were no ducks, there were French cyclists. And when the cyclists disappeared around a bend, thick, fluffy clouds danced across the sky, sometimes stealing the sun, sometimes letting him shine. For every step along the canal, something beautiful caught my eye.

I reached a row of moored boats that led to the village of Le Somail. Across the old brick bridge I bought a couple of postcards.

'Bonjour,' I said to the lady behind the counter.

'Bonjour.'

'S'il vous plait,' I said, handing over two postcards.

'Merci.' She put them into bags. 'Quatre Euro.'

I handed over ten Euros, received six in change, said 'Merci beaucoup' and 'Au revoir' and left the shop with a big grin on my face. I did it, I thought. I can still speak French after ten years without it in my life.

Dogs and ducks came over to say hello as I perched on a stump near the canal, still grinning. 'Bonjour,' I said to them, feeling the joie de vivre.

After ten minutes of absorbing Le Somail, I set off on my return journey back along the canal. On passing the locals I shouted 'Bonjour!' with new vigour. I even had a quick 'Oui' when one young lady probably said something about it being a nice day.

But then it all went wrong.

Yesterday, I spoke to two Scottish ladies who'd decided to cycle along the canal du midi for over 80km. Today, halfway back to Ventenac, where I'm staying for the week, I thought I saw the same ladies. Yesterday they'd tried their French on me. I apologised and said I was Anglais. They laughed and said, 'Thank God. We're from Scotland'. Today, I thought I'd spotted the same ladies. So I waved from about 20 metres and shouted 'Hello!'.

Two problems. These weren't the same ladies. And these ladies were French. Very French.

'Bonjour, Monsieur,' said the one with the map. Then, as far as I could tell, she said 'La mer ou saucisson' while pointing one way along the canal, then the other.

Now, my French isn't great. But I know 'mer' means 'the sea', 'ou' means 'or', and a saucisson is a French sausage.

I processed the words, translated what I thought I'd heard, and panicked. Instead of saying 'Sorry, I'm English and my French isn't very good', I said something like 'Pardon, mai je suis Anglais et ma Francais c'est not very good'.

I'd Franglaised her. And for a moment she was stumped.

But then she reacted. Reacted in French. Repeating the same statement about the sea and the sausage. And she pointed again and this time giggled. Like it was a joke. A French joke. I'd heard we have a different sense of humour. But surely not this different? Maybe. Maybe I'd fallen for the old sea/sausage pun.

I did the only thing I could think to do. I Gallic-shrugged.

I inched away from her saying 'Pardon, je suis Anglais', hoping that me apologising for being English would make things better. As I turned and walked away, she told me once more about the sea and the sausage. But this time she started it with 'beacoup'.

Next year, I'm planning to drive around Europe for three months. I want to dive in to different cultures, enjoy new experiences.

In some ways, I'd like to know more French. And more German. And some Italian. And Dutch, Swedish, Spanish, Portuguese.

In other ways, I think it'll be fun to learn as I travel.

After all, beacoup la mer ou saucisson.

Where's he gone?

2011-06-02T14:22:00.001+01:00

I'm away from my desk (and England) for three weeks. How will I cope?

I'll probably stroll around the south of France in shorts and mules, sipping the culture. Then, a couple of days later, explore the streets of New York with friends and camera.

Ventenac nr Carcassonne, France (4th to 11th June)

Last year, I took the train to Northumberland and enjoyed a few days of writing exercises on a Dark Angels writing course with John Simmons and Stuart Delves.

This year, John invited me to a Dark Angels writing retreat in a chateau in the village of Ventenac, near Carcassonne, the largest medieval city in Europe. It's me and seven other writers. And pens, paper, books and laptops. And ~~wine~~ many litres of Merlot, Carignan and rosé. And ~~fine~~ superb French cuisine, cooked by a ~~man~~ bubbly, softly spoken, sweet French lady named Freddi.

New York (13th to 22nd June)

I've wanted to visit New York for a couple of years. Ever since my 2009 Moonwalking adventure got quite popular on the east coast of America.

About a month ago, my Australian friend Sally emailed me from Brooklyn. She told me I should pop over and visit her while she tried to find some work placements. Then a good friend from Cornwall moved to an agency there. And said I could stay with him whenever I wanted to.

So for nine days I'll be staying with Simon and learning more about New York and New Yorkers. I'll be dropping in to a couple of agencies. I'll be trying to tag along when Simon enjoys his film-star parties (ok, there was one once - but I'm hopeful). I'll be seeing the sights with Sally. And I hear poetry slams are pretty amazing. And a cruise along the Hudson River is a must.

While I'm away

I'll be writing in France. But not emailing.

I'll be travelling and experiencing in New York. But not writing much. But emailing a bit.

So if you've emailed me and ended up here, I hope this explains everything.

I'll return a better writer. And reply to you then.

Rob SP

I now enjoy listening to classical music

2011-05-27T09:43:00.000+01:00

I now enjoy listening to classical music.

It moves me. It tells me stories. It holds my hand and takes me back to the rooms where composers sit and compose.

I now wonder what went through the minds of these composers. How inspiration stroked some of them - lulled them into writing. How inspiration slapped some of them - hurt them into crashing.

Classical music is a quiet night with a red wine when there's a party two houses down. Classical music is one distant wave working its way to the shore before crashing and fizzling. Classical music is a blackbird's song to a starling's squawk, or a starling's squawk to a blackbird's song.

I now enjoy listening to classical music.

Drop the act

2011-05-21T23:00:00.000+01:00

I spent yesterday with Sam Gray at Tamar Science Park in Plymouth. Sam's a graphic designer and creative director. More than that - he's a nice bloke with oodles of knowledge and bundles of creativity.

Sam and I worked together on The Playing Place. And, for as long as I can remember now, we've been in contact at least once a day. To share ideas, discuss possibilities and look for opportunities.

Sam's passing along a fascinating stretch of life at the moment. He's looking back to move forwards. He's finding what makes him tick, and which direction's best for him in life. He's putting in huge amounts of effort to make sure he and his family are happy. And that he's always doing something that brings him happiness.

I think happiness is the perfect goal for humans.

I write for lots of companies. I read lots of mission statements. And not once have I read a mission statement that says 'We want to bring a bit more happiness into people's lives'. I've read statements of companies that want to change the world, and statements where a company wants to maximise profits and improve efficiency. But never happiness. Which is odd, because these companies are run by humans. And work with humans.

They dehumanise their writing. They hide behind a wall of what they think companies should write. It often seems they don't know what it feels like to be human. To interact with others. To feel, touch, listen, love, lust after, care for, look out for, understand, discuss with, strive for, look back at, look for, put huge amounts of effort into, make sure of, bring, take, give, receive.

Speak to them, ask them what they want, prod a little and engage them, and they'll drop the act. They'll open up. They'll share and tell you about what they want to do in future (not their 'mission'), where they think they can be in five years' time (not their 'vision'), and what they're most proud of (not their 'values').

Sam's taking everything that he's learning about life and love and happiness and putting it to good use. Soon, Fabric will come to life and bring a little bit more creativity into the world.

Until then, find out more about Sam and Fabric by following him on Twitter @madebyfabric.

Spoken words

2011-05-17T10:05:00.000+01:00

Last Friday, I had the pleasure of introducing An evening of spoken word - an event put on by the writers' organisation 26. We brought together the spoken word artists Joshua Idehen, Polar Bear and Inua Ellams. And we invited them to perform in front of lots of people - some who knew the art, some who were meeting it for the first time.

Josh started the evening.

Then Polar Bear came on stage.

Then Inua.

Thank you, three.

26 presents...

2011-05-05T12:30:00.000+01:00

An evening of spoken word

with Polar Bear, Joshua Idehen and Inua Ellams

Ever been to a gig where the performers tell stories? No music. No instruments. Just words. Tales. Narratives. Ever seen three people share a stage and share their stories to entertain? That’s spoken word.

Hear Polar Bear, Joshua Idehen and Inua Ellams use rhyme and rhythm to bring stories to life at Woolfson & Tay this spring. They’ll take you through their imaginations and bring you into their lives.

Place Woolfson & Tay Bookshop, Café, Gallery, Bermondsey Square, London SE1 3UN

Date Friday 13th May 2011

Time 6.45pm for 7pm start

Tickets Free to members of 26 – though there are only 50 spaces available for members, so be quick. Another 26 tickets, £5 each, are available to non-members.

If you’re a member of 26, email Rachel Moore at events@26.org.uk to book your place. If you’re not a member, email Rachel and let her know you’d like one of the 26 extra spaces. Again, be quick. Spaces will disappear in a couple of days.

Become a member of 26 If you’d like to join 26, it’s £26 for a year. You gets lots of wordy treats for your money: more events like this, a lively online forum, a monthly newsletter and the chance to get involved in national writing projects like 26 Treasures.

About the artists

Polar Bear is a writer from Birmingham. He uses balance and rhythm to deliver stories of life, love and, now and then, World Cups.

Joshua Idehen co-founded the collective A Poem Inbetween People and organises the spoken word event PoeJazzi. Stories spill from his mind and mouth.

Inua Ellams is a word and graphic artist in love with rhythm and rhyme, line and form. When he’s not telling stories, he’s documenting life through design.

It's good to step away

2011-04-22T10:25:00.002+01:00

It's easy to get bogged down in words. When you spend every day writing, they sometimes merge, or dance on the page in front of you, or twist themselves, contort themselves, sit like naughty children in the wrong places on the school bus. They're all there. They just won't behave.

So you need to step away. Or, to be more accurate, I need to step away.

And that's what I've managed to do this week.

Two years ago, I wanted to write scripts, travel and write non-fiction. I still do. But I'm more realistic about it these days. Today, when I find the time, I write scripts because I enjoy it. I travel because it lets me meet interesting people and wander into their lives for a bit, and see beautifully different places around the world. And I write non-fiction because that's the genre that comes most naturally to me.

Today, I also write for businesses. Sometimes, managing directors ask me to look over something they've written, and edit it a bit. Other times, agencies ask me to define a 'tone of voice' for their clients.

Business writing makes up 70% of my working life. Another 20% is made up of creative projects with various organisations, usually 26. The other 10%, which comes when I find the time, when the first 80% goes a bit quiet, I dedicate to writing scripts and non-fiction, and travelling.

For me, that's stepping away. Not stepping away from words - they always come with me. But stepping from one hobby into another. And letting those contorting words straighten themselves out on a different page.

So this week I stepped away. I got on with some script-editing for a script I'm writing with a great writer and good friend. I planned my next series of journeys in a bit more detail. And I sat and looked out to sea from the balcony of my flat in Cornwall and took in all the possiblities that life lays in front of us.

I realised the value of stepping away.

Living, loving and learning

2011-04-05T09:43:00.001+01:00

I love learning and doing new things. I'm not sure I get the same buzz from anything else. So when I visited North Rhine Westphalia in Germany last Friday to research for a new adventure I'm planning (remember I mentioned it here?), I did as much as I could. And, with the help of a lovely, friendly, selfless German couple, I managed to live, love and learn about German culture for a few days.

There's too much to tell about my long weekend here. But I'm designing a new website over the next couple of months and will share stories there once I'm ready. I'll add other stories over the next couple of years as I head off on more European trips.

First though, here's a slice of German culture. And a little story about some wonderful etymology.

Inside St.-Kalixtus-Kirche (the church of St Callixtus) in the village of Riesenbeck in Hoerstel, Bernhard and Elke told me about Carnival. But not carnival as I knew it - a big celebration of light, colour, music and exuberance. No, Carnival from the Catholic calendar.

Some villages in Hoerstel are Catholic, some Protestant. Bernhard was brought up Catholic but his wife, Elke, Protestant. Before Lent, in the run-up to Easter, a parade would run through the village of Bevergern - this was Carnival. The children of the other villages would run to Bevergern to join the celebrations.

'You know Carnival?' asked Bernhard.

'Um... I think so,' I replied. 'Big celebration? Colours, light, music, dancing...'

'No, no - more, more. From the Catholic church.'

'It's from the Latin, to put away meat,' said Elke. 'From carne, meat, and vale, to put away.'

Carnival is a Catholic display of fun, celebration and possibly a little sensual pleasure in the lead-up to Lent - the time when Christians behave before Easter. Traditionally, Catholics refrain from eating meat or partying during Lent, a time of piousness and penitence. So Carnival is an excuse to lose yourself. Then Shrove Tuesday (Pancake Day to the English) is the day to ask forgiveness for everything you did the days before. Another possible root of the word is 'farewell to the flesh': Carnival being your last chance to enjoy your body (and possibly other people's) before Lent.

If I hadn't flown to North Rhine Westphalia last Friday and lived with Bernhard and Elke for a few days and said yes when they asked if I'd like to look around St.-Kalixtus-Kirche in Reisenbeck and admitted that I didn't really know what Carnival was, I'd never have learned. And loved that learning.

As soon as they told me about the village celebrations and the etymology of 'Carnival', it all made sense. A carnivore will eat meat. Chilli con carne is a big meaty feast. Carnations are flesh coloured. Carnage is the slaughter of flesh.

So if you're Catholic, Carnival is your last chance to have a little fun before penitence begins to mark Jesus's 40 days of fasting in the desert. If you're not Catholic, it's just an excuse to let your hair down and enjoy yourself. Either way, it's a word full of stories.

Thank you, Bernhard and Elke, for being so kind and warm, and for sharing so many stories.

Come and play

2011-03-21T20:42:00.000Z

I can’t say no to an interesting idea.

So when I heard this – ‘They’re putting together lots of creative exhibitions inside shipping containers for the Cornwall Design Season. Pete Kirby’s creative director of it’ – I knew I had to speak to Pete.

When I moved to Cornwall last autumn for a year of writing by the sea, to relax after a couple of years in and around the City, John Simmons told me I should speak to Pete. ‘He walks a lot,’ John told me. ‘And he’s very creative. I think you’d get on.’

I spoke to Pete. He sounded very creative. We got on. And he told me about the shipping containers. ‘We’ve got about 30 themes. Things that Cornwall should be very proud of and wants to shout about. People like Kevin McCloud have nominated them. Themes like the Eden Project, The Minack Theatre, Goonhilly satellite station. We’re now looking for creative teams to bring the containers to life.’

He said he’d send me the brief…

Each shipping container or ‘design box’ is a self-contained gallery. The only rules are don’t be dull and avoid the usual Cornish clichés (yes, we all know them). We want you to be brave and amaze people. This is a contemporary season with its eye on the future. Think lateral, not literal.

What a brilliant brief. It hooked me. I wanted in. I spoke to John and Tim Rich and had the backing of 26. Then I spoke to a man called Sam.

Around Christmas, I was given my theme. Amphitheatres – The Minack and Plain-an-Gwarry. And an idea jumped into my head. Magnetic stories – stories that stick. Make full use of the magnetic container and encourage visitors to play with language. I spoke to Sam again.

Sam’s a graphic designer and creative director. He’d once interviewed John, who’d told me I should speak to him. John thought we’d get on. So I told Sam all about the Cornwall Design Season. ‘I’m in!’ said Sam.

We met in the middle of January, in a supermarket café just outside Bodmin. Sam had a sketchpad. I had a notepad. He sketched, I wrote. He wrote, I sketched. We thought up then discarded a million ideas. But this meeting saw the start of something very very big.

It was the start of The Playing Place – a place to play with words.

On March 26th 2011, in the middle of Lemon Quay, the main shopping area in Truro, Cornwall, you’ll find a multicoloured shipping container. Step inside and you’ll enter The Playing Place.

You’ll see ten theatre posters, written by leading writers from around the country, including the poet Maura Dooley and scriptwriter James Henry, and designed by some leading designers, including Domenic Lippa and Gilmar Wendt. On the far wall, you’ll see a theatre set, with stories snaking through waves, clouds and fearsome sea. Grass will soften your steps. Messages will prompt you to tell stories. While online, actors will be waiting to bring words to life.

Please come along. It’s free to get in. Bring your friends, your family, and your smartphone if you’ve got one.

And enjoy playing.

When & where: 26th March – 25th April 2011, Truro, Cornwall

Website: www.theplayingplace.com (coming soon)

Map: http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=lemon+quay+truro&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Lemon+Quay,+Truro+TR1,+United+Kingdom&gl=uk&z=16

Cornwall Design Season: www.cornwalldesignseason.co.uk

This seems a good time to say thank you to Sam Gray , Jay Roerade and Mike Cobb. Without these three creative engines, The Playing Place couldn’t have happened. Thank you, team.

26 Flavours of Cornwall - guest post

2011-03-16T09:33:00.001Z

A journey into food, drink and creativity

Written by Tom Scott

Over the next few months, 26 writer-designer teams will be working together to create a unique exhibition: 26 Flavours of Cornwall. The show will run for exactly 26 days in July at Trebah Garden, a magically beautiful subtropical garden on Cornwall’s southwest coast.

Each team will be challenged to create a paper table-setting that shows a food or drink from Cornwall in a fresh light. These will be displayed both as wall-mounted posters and on the tables of Trebah’s award-winning Planter’s Café. And each day of the show, the café will be featuring one of the 26 flavours on its menu.

Why 26, precisely? Because this is the latest in a remarkable series of projects organised by the national writers’ collective 26, which takes its name from the 26 letters of the alphabet.

The first of these letters is of course ‘A’, for apple. And the idea for 26 Flavours grew from an apple, or rather from the experience of picking old varieties of Cornish apple in an orchard near my home in Falmouth. I became fascinated by these fruit, which could not have looked – or tasted – more different from the blandly uniform varieties favoured by supermarket buyers.

I found myself writing poems about apples and thinking about the links between food, drink and creativity. Cornwall offers such an amazing variety of superb natural produce, and the county’s crop of talented writers and designers is no less abundant (not that they grow on trees down here, of course).

Inspired by the example of previous 26 projects such as 26 Letters and 26 Treasures, I began to wonder whether there might be a way of bringing people from these different areas together to do something exciting. I ran this still only vaguely formed idea past friends in 26 and Cornwall’s design community, and with their help it began to take a more definite shape. Soon there was a small team of people all working hard to make it happen.

Fast-forwarding through a blur of phone calls, emails and meetings, here we are: about to set out on what should be the most intriguing part of the journey. At the beginning of April, we’ll be assigning a food or drink to each of our creative teams. They’ll be visiting farms, fishing boats, dairies, bakeries, breweries and all sorts of other places to find out more. And they’ll be posting news of their adventures in the world of Cornish food to this site between now and 1 July, when the show opens at Trebah Garden.

We’ll be giving our teams a very open brief, the main requirement being that their finished pieces should surprise, entertain or otherwise delight. We can’t wait to see what they come up with – and we hope you’ll come along to Trebah in July to find out.

Visit the website at www.26flavours.com

Cornwall Design Season

2011-03-07T22:32:00.000Z

In three weeks, you'll be able to visit the Playing Place in Truro. It'll be the home of storytelling in Cornwall. For just one month.

You'll find it inside a shipping container in Truro's Lemon Quay.

The Playing Place started to come to life when I met with Sam Gray, a great bloke and great designer, in a supermarket in Bodmin. We drank tea. And we talked about all the creative possibilities of a shipping container themed around amphitheatres in Cornwall.

Once the Playing Place is ready for you to play in, I'll write a full post about how to experience it. But first, here are a few images for you.

Cornwall Design Season's logo

The Minack Theatre (the inspiration)

Cousin Ben making waves

Starting a journey from Essex to Plymouth

Jay assesses the waves

Our routered tree arrives

Tell you more soon. About some of the UK's leading writers, designers and actors. The grass. The magnetic letters. The website. And all the other stuff.

'They don't have imaginations'

2011-02-20T15:25:00.002Z

Of course they do. They're children.

Last week, I spent five mornings in Hazelbury Junior School in Edmonton, giving some creative writing workshops to fourteen ten-year-olds. It was good. No, that's not right: look for a better adjective, or, better still, flip the sentence into a verb sentence, give it action, decorate it in different verbs, look for some alliteration, or some assonance, and paint a picture for the reader...

The children threw out the rules, played with sentences. Chopped some. Ran some on and on and on, into other sentences. They rhymed like lives and time depended on every line. They sketched beautiful images in words, they learned to move their readers, they learned about the rule of three. Some spoke with confidence from Monday. Others learned from each other.

They fell for freight-train sentences, but loved stopping them with one-word sentences. Or trying something punchy. For effect. To engage their reader.

They told stories in a semi-circle, tripped each other's tongues with spoken word exercises. They learned to stretch their vocabulary, to always look for a better verb, a better adjective, or a better way of saying the same thing.

They found that writing The wind whipped through the window, bringing buckets of rain into the crumbling church sounded much better than The weather was bad outside the church.

They turned a newspaper article about a beetle that lives in its own dung into a paragraph of fiction, then into a long poem, then into a haiku. Then they edited that haiku. And most went home and wrote another haiku and sprinted up to me the next morning and thrust it into my face.

They smiled, they giggled, they shouted, they engaged, they tried, then they tried again, they helped each other to edit, they helped each other to answer, they helped each other to enjoy.

Melissa, Billy, Jahed, Javan, Aaron, Pravisht, Gul, Abida, Elsie, Isobel, Samantha, Bejna, Sapiya, Indianna - keep playing, keep trying new things with language, keep writing and keep smiling.

As a final challenge, I asked the children to write 62 words about a treasure - something that means the world to them. In a week, I'll publish these pieces on the 26 Treasures website. Because each piece is good enough. Because each child listened, engaged, had fun and wrote some great stuff. Because, I found out last week, children have imaginations that go further than many adults can understand.

I'll give more workshops. Whenever I get the opportunity. Any writers out there reading this, I implore you to do the same. The reward is bigger than you'll realise.

Here are some of the children's responses to the challenges I set during the week (with only tiny edits from me):

Turn this newspaper article into a (paragraph of fiction, then a) poem...

Walking without making a sound,
The Pot beetle is once again
just one beetle roaming around,
living in his pooey house for another day.
Eating, hiding,
doing everything.
Living his life without a care.

by Elsie

I am a beetle
Looking down at my kingdom
Sitting on a leaf
How will I get there
If I am so terrified?
I have to be BRAVE

by Isobel

The hazel pot beetle died
everyone in the world cried
And sighed
The beetles died...
But they lied
Because they were alive
Hiding in his dung house.

by Aaron

The Beetle

My fudgie wudgie lovey dovey beetle
Oh how cute it is
My beetle's so crazy
Let me not forget and lazy
My fudgie wudgie lovey dovey beetle
It looks so pretty
and so glammed up.
My beetle will never lie,
For he is very shy.

by Samantha

We're beetles, yes, it's true
We're not extinct
It must be you, being stupid
As usual, you little savages,
Drinking Coke and riding in carriages

by Isobel

Turn your beetle poem into a haiku...

My little beetle
Leaves home with backpack on back
Skipping through his dung

by Samantha

A homeless beetle
looking at me wanting help
Oh what should I do?

by Abida

He hid quietly
Then he sat in his dung bed
'cause he was lonely

by Indianna

there he was looking
a beetle with a scare stare
there he was shooken'

by Melissa

Just me a beetle
Living in my own poo world
Roaming around, free

by Elsie

Because I am rare
The rest think I'm really mare
Lonely I live on

by Billy

A one-off story

When I got there she was already dead. Blood oozing from her side, seeping between her side and the spear that killed her. I had a flashback about yesterday. We were fighting for anything/nothing. I stormed out. I shouldn't have left her there. I was being selfish and now she's dead. It's all my fault. And my last words to her were: "I hate you! I wish you were dead." And now she is.

not sure who wrote this

Freight-train sentence, punchy sentence and one-word about a river

Swasshy and sploshy and splashy and streamy and flowy.

It was freezing. I was shivering.

Splish.

by Indianna

The river flowed and turned and bended until it came to the waterfall.

Let the river swirl freely into the lake.

by Melissa

The river curved and bended and meandered perfectly.

A rock was blocking it.

Disaster.

by Isobel

It flowed and flowed and cascaded down a luscious green hill and burst its banks. Splish. The river flooded.

by Pravisht

The river is a flow of happiness and will only stop at the very end, and is a long stream and can carry you off in an instant, and is a vibrant colour of blue. The river continues. Forever.

by Javon

Any combination of freight-train, punchy and one-word...

It was pouring and freezing and snowing and blowing and flashing and destroying everything in sight. It was the end.

not sure who wrote this

I ran and ran and said I'd never turn back but I stopped and realised that I was running for myself. I lay there and cried.

or this.

Still Innocent

2011-02-06T15:39:00.000Z

Many writers who write for business will tell you the same story. About the time one of their clients asked them to make their business sound like Innocent.

Innocent make fruit smoothies that are 100% pure fruit. The one word that sums them up, says Rich Reed, one of the founders of the company, is natural. The ingredients are natural, so the drinks are natural. And, which is where the can-you-make-us-sound-like-Innocent question comes in, Innocent's language is natural.

I've never been asked to write like Innocent. And, unless I was writing for Innocent, I don't think I could. Well, not in the way these clients might want me to.

Innocent's voice is right for Innocent because it shows off Innocent's personality. That personality comes from Richard, Dan Germain and the other founders of the company. Dan says it came from the way these university friends have always spoken to each other. When they turned their homemade smoothie-making fun into a business, and Innocent became a brand, they just wrote for it like they'd been speaking to each other for years.

So instead of these drinks being beneficial for your health, they were just a bit tasty.

Above, I've said I don't think I could make a client sound like Innocent. That's not a comment on my ability to write. It's because of my belief that many clients (but not all) don't know what they're asking for when they ask a writer to make them sound like Innocent. John Simmons, in a talk he gave in Falmouth, Cornwall, said his response to a client asking this question would be: 'No. Because you're not Innocent.'

That's my response, too, if the client means they want to write we love instead of we respect the opinions of, or let's work this out instead of we must come to an agreed arrangement on this that benefits all parties.

But maybe as business language evolves, and more businesses realise the potential in sharing the qualities of their products or services in language that entertains, persuades, informs, makes people laugh, makes people cry or evokes another emotional response, maybe these clients are actually asking for their writer to show them the Innocent approach to writing.

And that's to be natural. Not to confuse people, not to promise too much, not to dress-up or make fancy, or even to make simple and risk patronising people. But to write in a way that connects with people and shares the best bits of your brand while being honest about all those other bits that you'd rather not mention.

I'm writing this post because at lunch time today, after a long walk around the headland in Falmouth, I bought a carton of Innocent smoothie. I fancied another health kick after my walk. And I knew Innocent used 100% pure fruit in their drinks. I popped into the supermarket, I picked up my carton, I paid for it. Then, when I was eating lunch, I read some of the packaging. And I saw this:

And it made me laugh.

And it reminded me why I like Innocent.

And now I'm looking forward to buying my next carton, to see what they write next.

Collaboration & goodwill

2011-01-31T23:31:00.001Z

Last week, I listened to John Simmons give a talk about creative collaboration at University College Falmouth. John talked the audience through some of the projects he's been part of during his career. Organisations he's worked with include Royal Mail, International PEN and Guinness. Some of this work was paid, some was voluntary.

Over the last few months, I've been working on many collaborative projects. And I've been overwhelmed by the time and effort that my many collaborators have put in. Writers, designers, developers, photographers, creative directors, lecturers and actors have worked with me, and worked with each other, pouring ideas and effort into projects of all sizes.

And not once has anyone spoken about money.

Money, of course, pays bills. And money gives a value to time. But it's been refreshing - and delightful - to work with so many talented people, all of whom are valuable in their own way, with no mention of money, just talk of how to make things better.

Novak Djokovic won the Australian Open at the weekend. In his speech after the match, he made a point of telling the world how important collaboration is, even in tennis, which looks like a solo performance. There are so many people behind the scenes, he told his fans, and without them I wouldn't be winning sport's biggest tournaments.

I'm sure many members of Novak's team are employed by him, and paid. But there will be others who offer their friend time, energy, patience and love in return for nothing. Just to make Novak feel better and play better.

Collaboration can be so much more valuable than money. When everyone's working together to achieve the same thing, it can put a smile on every face.

An interview with me: about life and writing

2011-01-16T10:38:00.000Z

Here's a quick interview I gave to John Fountain from creativepool last week. I'm no expert. Just happy to pass on the things I'm learning about life and writing.

So Rob, I like your company LinkedIn profile where you say - ‘If someone in a company can't think of a good way to write something, I'll help them to write it. If they've tried writing something and it's confusing other people, I'll help them to write it in a different way.’ Is business writing something you enjoy?

It is, yes. It’s something I knew very little about before I got involved. Now it’s something that challenges me every day.

Though I usually call myself a writer rather than copywriter. I write everything, from corporate guidelines to travel blogs. If I tell someone outside the industry I’m a copywriter, they just stare at me. When I explain what it means, they sometimes ask to read something I’ve written. So I send them my travel writing.

I approach writing for business in the same way I approach writing blog posts, scripts or non-fiction. The end results are sometimes very different. But the thinking, scribbling and playing with language – these are always the same for me.

I like writing that hooks and entertains me. Writing that tells me something I didn’t know in an engaging way. Or reveals something new about something I thought I understood.

When I write for business people, I like to show them how they can bring storytelling or speech-writing techniques to their work. To hook and entertain. Whether they’re writing emails to customers or guidelines for staff.

You’re a young chap and I was wondering if business people ever pass comment about your age. Do they think you may be a bit young to fully appreciate the subtle nuances of their offshore market strategy?

Actually, age has never been a problem. Experience was the challenge when I started. I spoke to agencies and tried to give away my time. I said I could write and that I’d recently graduated with degrees in English and writing. But nobody would listen.

Experience helps convince people to trust you. But it’s also dangerous. As Michael Wolff once said to me: ‘Experience is my biggest enemy. It makes me think I know what I’m doing.’

If the offshore market strategy people want a writer who’s written lots of offshore marketing strategy documents before, I’m sure they’ll find one. If they want a writer who knows little about offshore market strategies but who’s curious to know more and eager to write about the subject in an engaging way, maybe they’ll try someone like me.

And you went freelance at just 24? Most writers tend to spend their formative years inside an agency and work towards running their own business, what was your thinking?

When I was 24, I didn’t realise that.

I think a bit of naivety is a good thing. I came into business writing after a summer of scriptwriting at university. I got a job at a web development agency. But after a year of writing emails to clients and putting briefs and proposals together, I realised I wanted to do much more.

Moonwalking played a major part in my decision to leave the agency. Throughout 2009, once a month, I’d been travelling around Britain, researching the moon and meeting people who enjoyed doing intriguing things by moonlight. Every minute away from my desk persuaded me that I wasn’t suited to a single path in life. I decided I was a project man.

It was only when I went freelance that people started to tell me that writers don’t usually make these decisions at my age. I worried a little. Then I spoke to John Simmons. John told me to go for it.

With a lot of enthusiasm, and with the support of some good people, I bought a few business cards, redesigned my website, and headed into a new world.

It’s never easy to get started as a writer. How have you found it, what lessons would you pass on?

Listen to everyone. Then decide what’s best for you.

James Henry, the scriptwriter, gave me that advice after I’d received some criticism from a producer who’d read one of my scripts. James was my tutor when I was studying in Cornwall. As a writer, I put myself into everything I write. Some people will like my writing, some won’t. James taught me to listen to everyone’s views, say thank you, then decide which advice to heed.

Nobody knows everything. That’s something else I’ve found. If you believe William Goldman, nobody knows anything. I think that’s important to remember. People told George Lois he couldn’t put Tommy Hilfiger on the same advert as Ralph Lauren in 1985. They told JK Rowling nobody would read about a boy wizard. They tried to convince Ricky Gervais that people wouldn’t find an office sitcom funny.

I’ve learned to embrace every challenge and work harder when things aren’t going well. That’s something I’d recommend.

You’ve got some very interesting ideas. I love the fact that you go into Junior Schools to give writing workshops and I’ve always been intrigued about your moonwalking project. How did those ideas come about?

I can’t say no to an interesting project.

At a family wedding last year, I chatted with a teacher from a primary school in Edmonton (north London). Lauren told me that her school didn’t have a script for its Year 6 play. So I volunteered to write one.

I popped along to the school one summer’s evening to watch the children perform. And they were brilliant. Mums, dads, brothers, sisters and teachers smiled throughout. Afterwards, Lauren invited me back to the school some time to help the children with their language skills. So, in February, I’ll be taking a week of creative writing workshops with a dozen or so pupils.

It’s always great to hear children’s ideas, and encourage them to embrace their imaginations. It’s not about hammering grammar into them. It’s allowing them to have fun with words. That’s why I think The Ministry of Stories is such a great idea.

Moonwalking was my opportunity to have some fun. And to see places across Britain I’d always been curious about, meet interesting people, and do something that was just a bit different. I enjoy reading Bill Bryson, Charlie Connelly, Roger Deakin and other narrative non-fiction writers. And I thought, I’d like a go at that travelling and writing lark.

At the end of 2008, everything came together and I knew I had to spend 2009 with the moon. An email from Tarot.com told me to do it. And a white witch and her tarot cards encouraged me. So every full moon for a year – including a blue moon on New Year’s Eve – I booked a B&B somewhere in the country, packed my case and headed off to see what scrapes I could get into. Then I wrote about it all on a blog.

The blog’s still there if anyone fancies finding out more – www.discoveringbritainbyfullmoon.blogspot.com

Let’s look at last year. You say 2010 was the year you started to make a success of writing for a living. Looking back, what would you say were the highlights?

26 Treasures at the V&A was fun. I had an idea in January 2010 to turn art into words, to interpret paintings using language. I spoke to John Simmons. He spoke to Ben Evans from the London Design Festival. Ben and John pitched the idea to the V&A. They loved it but asked that we focus on objects instead of paintings. We agreed, but called these objects ‘treasures’.

During the first half of 2010, John and I worked with some great people on the project, including Olivia Sprinkel and Daniel Oparison. 26 Treasures became an exhibition in the British Galleries 1500-1760 at the museum during the Festival in September. Thousands of people visited the V&A and our website. And we had very positive feedback from the Festival organisers.

Dark Angels was another highlight. In May, I enjoyed a writing weekend in Northumberland National Park with John Simmons, Stuart Delves and other Angels. The Dark Angels course gave me an excuse to play with language again. And it came at a perfect time: when I’d started to have a few doubts about my writing. John and Stuart motivated me. They reminded me how important writing is. And, which I’ll always remember, how it’s something we should enjoy doing. I learned that as challenging as the writing life can sometimes seem, I’m very lucky to be able to earn a living from my hobby.

There were business writing highlights too. I got to know the wonderful people at The Writer. I spent a little time with Start Creative. I made friends at Elmwood, Pearlfisher, The Partners and a few other agencies.

And, which I’m still really chuffed about, I was made a member of the board at 26. Now, not only do I find myself working with some of the best writers and designers in the country, I can call a lot of these people my friends.

The success of 26 Treasures continues. I read on your blog that this year it’s going outside London. Can you give us any more information?

Only a little at this stage.

26 Treasures was very popular. The V&A and London Design Festival told us how much they’d enjoyed the exhibition. And the V&A challenged us to give the idea a twist for 2011. That’s what we’ve been working on over the last few months. We’ve added some new members to our team and they’re helping us take 26 Treasures to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. These regional exhibitions will celebrate something unique about these countries. While at the V&A we’re still developing that twist.

In the next couple of months I’ll be able to say much more. But if people are curious before then, we’ll be updating the website (www.26treasures.com) and Twitter (@26Treasures) with our latest news.

So tell us about your plans for the year ahead. Where does your story go from here?

Cornwall at the moment. There’s an exciting 26 project brewing in the South West, bringing together creativity and local produce. I’m part of the team behind this one. People can find out more by emailing team[at]26flavours.com. And there’s another very exciting something happening down here over spring. But I’m sworn to secrecy on that one.

Then Europe. Travel adventure number two begins in 2011. Not the moon for this journey, but a theme that gives me an excuse to travel around the Continent. And this time I’ll be inviting friends, family and followers to get involved with the project. I’ll launch the website in a few months and reveal all.

Then there are more writing projects with businesses, workshops with schools, meetings with interesting people. And perhaps a little nap if I can find some time.

"Listen to everyone.

2011-01-06T21:23:00.002Z

Then decide what's best for you."

That's the best advice I think I can give. Because it's the best advice ever given to me.

I've been thinking about advice recently. That's because I'll be offering some to lots of different people of lots of different ages in the next month. All about the same subject: writing.

In a couple of weeks, I'll return to my alma mater (that's Latin, it means nourishing or bountiful mother), Roehampton University. One of my old lecturers has asked me to sit on a panel and offer advice to undergrad students on writing courses there.

In a few weeks, I'll be asking a room of undergrad designers and postgrad writers to work together on a brief. A few days later, I'll be sitting with John Simmons and other heavyweights from the creative industry and giving the students advice, after they've pitched their work to us.

Next month, I'll be taking a week of writing workshops with the 'gifted and talented' children in a primary school in north London. Their teacher tells me they're very keen on language. But sometimes they need to be stretched a little.

The children at the primary school will be about 10 years old. The undergrads about 20. Some of the postgrads might be 40 or 50 or 60.

My advice will be the same to them all.

Listen to everyone. Then decide what's best for you.

And, most importantly, enjoy yourself while you're doing it.

(Take a look to the right of this page. The bit called 'I've just learned'. It's all about choices.)

Resolute at New Year

2010-12-30T18:26:00.000Z

It's coming to the end of 2010 and I'm excited. This year I started to make a success of writing for a living. I helped put together a national exhibition. I started to write my first book. And I laid foundations for 2011, when:

...once again I'll help turn 26 Treasures into an exhibition of words. But this time around Britain, not just in London.

...I'll help 26 to put on an exhibition of words and design at the Eden Project in Cornwall, to celebrate local food and drink.

...someone will give me a shipping container and I'll get a team together to transform it into an interactive wordy place, to celebrate creativity (especially writing) in the South West.

...I'll develop two scripts. One a comedy about a young man whose life changes dramatically in a night (in an accident). The other about a young lady with an extraordinary gift. This second one I'm co-writing. It's the first time I've co-written a script. I'm very excited.

...I'll visit Hazelbury Junior School and give a week of writing workshops to some of the children.

...later in the year I'll start a journey that's been a couple of years in the making. I hinted at it at the end of Moonwalking (here). And soon - with a lot of support and a pioneer's spirit - I'll set off for the Continent on a quest to answer the question that sparked the idea to begin with. In a couple of months, I'll share that question.

And I'll invite you to get involved in my 2011/12 European travel adventure.

See you next year...

Not everyone diets after Christmas...

2010-12-19T12:20:00.000Z

Just a little reminder for this festive season. As beautiful as it looks outside, this weather's not great for our feathered friends. (Click on the image below to find a good recipe for helping them this winter.)

And here are some more tips, from the good people at the RSPB.

Up for a sporting challenge?

2010-12-17T09:11:00.002Z

Yesterday I joined in a little hashtag game on Twitter. The Writer challenged its followers to turn their favourite 19th-century books into six words. What a tight constraint. But these are the sorts of constraints writers face every day. Often I'm asked to write 100 words or 500 characters or enough words to fit this design. Or even no more than 6,000 words for that chapter.

Here are my six words (see if you can guess the book):

Transylvanian count - pain in the neck.

This challenge reminded me about an idea I had earlier in the year.

I read this week that Carlos Tevez (who plays football for Manchester City) earns about £250,000 a week. Please read that again. It's shocking. Most of the football players in England's top division must be earning over £10,000 a week. Ronnie O Sullivan earns £147,000 if he scores 147 points in a game of snooker in the world championships. The top tennis players earn a lot, too. And other sports men and women.

Millions of people around the world love these sports. They pay hundreds or thousands of pounds for tickets to the stadiums. They give up time with families to cheer their team on. They sit for hours in front of screens, click for hours on a mouse, get text updates, email newsletters, debate teams and players in pubs and cafes and offices.

Sport is a magical thing. It brings people together. Sport is also a ludicrous thing. It generates billions of pounds and pays billions of pounds. It is its own economy.

The English Football Association was founded in 1863. That year, a group of men put rules together for kicking a ball around. They said things like no tripping each other and no handling the ball. In 2010, the rules are very similar. But football is a different animal entirely.

So like The Writer did with 19th-century books, I'm challenging you to turn the world's favourite sports (and games) into ten words (hyphenated words count as one). I'm not talking about what sport means to us today, socially, politically or financially. You have ten words to describe how the sport - which billions watch, billions play, which generates billions of pounds and dollars and Euros and Yen - works.

Time to bring sport back to its grass roots.

I'll kick us off:

Snooker
Two people, a table, two sticks. Plus you need balls.

.

About 26

2010-12-07T21:01:00.003Z

You'll find the number 26 is everywhere. Add up any two numbers and you'll get 26 (trust me). Open a book at random and you'll open it on page 26 (again, you don't need to try). Get on a bus. It'll be the 26 (take my word for it). Click on this link and you'll end up at a website about a writers' organisation called 26 (you can try this one).

I've mentioned 26 a few times on this blog. I joined the group in eary 2009. A friend said I should. It's good fun, he said. He was right.

26 is here to inspire a greater love of words, in business and in life. I read business visions and values and beliefs and missions every day. It's rare that one speaks as honestly as this.

A few months ago, 26 invited me to join the Board. I'm now proud to be one of a team of excellent writers and creative people from around the country (they're excellent, I'm learning).

2010 has been a big year for the organisation. We put on an exhibition of words in the British Galleries 1500-1760 at the V&A in September, as part of the London Design Festival (LDF). We worked with the International Visual Communications Association (the IVCA) to create 26 Seconds - a collaborative project between writers and filmmakers (also for the LDF). Membership grew to over 300. We redesigned our website.

And we planted seeds that will grow in 2011. Like 26 Flavours of Cornwall - an exhibition in the South West that will celebrate local food, drink and creativity. And 26 Treasures 2011. A bit like this year's exhibition at the V&A. Except bigger. And a bit different.

People around the country are talking about 26. Actually, around the world - after our appearance in a Chinese magazine's review of the highlights of the LDF last week. There's a buzz. We're doing our best to promote that greater love of words, in business and in life.

Joining 26 for a year costs £26.

For that money, people get the chance to work on projects with the V&A, the London Design Festival, the British Library, the Scotch Malt Whisky Society, International PEN, London Underground. And soon others, who we're partnering with as I write.

I'm going to add a link to 26 on the side of my blog. Click on it and you'll visit a world of words. Become part of that world and tomorrow your words could be visiting some beautiful places and meeting some wonderful people.

Criticism

2010-11-28T21:15:00.000Z

I'm not perfect.

There, I said it.

When I was about 17, and I thought about my writing, I knew I knew it all. Even when people told me I still had a lot to learn, I dismissed their appraisal. At 17, I knew I knew it all. And I had a good feeling I could change the world.

Almost ten years later, I've filled my mind with lots more information. But now, instead of feeling I know more than it all, I think I know very little. And that's probably the most exciting thought that comes into my head every day. Exciting because it means I have a lot more to learn. And exciting because I'm surrounded by some brilliant people who teach me something new whenever I listen to them.

In the last almost ten years, I've learned to like criticism. Not the rubbish stuff that just tells me I've done something wrong. The stuff that teaches me something new.

A couple of years ago, I was lucky to work with the TV scriptwriter James Henry. He told me to listen to all criticism. Then to thank the person who's offered it. Then to look at that criticism and decide whether it's going to help the script I'm writing. If I think yes, use the suggestions - and produce a better piece of work. If no, put it to one side and carry on.

I think good criticism is good advice from someone who can help me. Other criticism is usually advice from someone who's trying to help me. Usually I'm just grateful that someone has taken the time to give me any advice at all.

(I still think I can change the world.)

This week's blog about writing is in pictures

2010-11-22T23:37:00.000Z

Olivia Sprinkel (sustainable_ on Twitter) shared this last Thursday.

Different writers' approaches to writing and walking interest me. And this article inspired me. To walk. So on Sunday I walked - around Boscastle and Bossiney on the north Cornwall coast. Instead of writing, I took pictures. Here are a few.

Life writing

2010-11-15T23:36:00.000Z

The first writing class that made me realise I wanted to write creatively every day of my life was called 'Life Writing'. Like life drawing, it showed us nakedness and asked us to use our creativity to craft something. Just the naked body was language. Peter Jaeger taught life writing at Roehampton University. He covered a thousand things. But he taught me one main lesson. That writing isn't a way of earning a living: it's a way of living.

A year later, I read a book by Annie Dillard. It was called The Writing Life. It was beautiful.

Life. Writing. Writing. Life.

Now, I'm typing in a flat in Cornwall. Tomorrow, I need to call the US to chat with a lady who runs an interesting shop in Iowa. Then I'll be developing a voice for her brand. At the weekend, it's meetings with old friends. Probably to talk about our writing lives.

In the spring, I'm teaching ten year olds how to express themselves in words (without all those rules of education and curriculum).

Next year, I'll travel again. So I can see Europe. But also so I've got something to write about.

Some people can't help writing. They think in stories. They talk in tales. They walk through words. Ideas grab them. Creativity releases them. They dream about clauses, make love to conjunctions. Some days words treat these people well. Some days they're nasty, they won't play the game. But every day they persist, treating these two imposters just the same.

Because life is a game. And writing is a game.

I think we should play to enjoy.

The Nature of writing

2010-11-08T10:20:00.002Z

I was enjoying dinner with a young lady the other evening. We'd picked a nice restaurant near Tower Bridge. As we stared outside to the Thames, which was flickering under the lit bridge, she asked me about my writing. She goes to the theatre a lot, and writes for theatre. I don't go to the theatre anywhere near as often as she does. But I still enjoy writing plays.

That puzzled her: the idea of enjoying writing for theatre, but not going enough to find out what other writers are trying at the moment.

This used to get to me, too.

At 15, I rediscovered the joy of writing after years of doing other stuff. I decided to read a bit more. I chose to write a lot more. I studied the language, then literature, then writing. I still didn't read as much as people told me I should. But I still wrote a lot. A few chapters of a children's book, articles, short stories, essays, non-fiction, a few poems, scripts.

I read books. But still not as many as people told me I should. And it used to get to me.

Then, one day a couple of years ago, I realised something. We all read every day. We read words everywhere. We speak and listen to words in every conversation we have. Words, and their ability to help us communicate, help humans be human. But more: they give us the opportunity to be creative. And I think that's the answer to my not reading enough of the right thing quandary.

Yesterday I crunched along the river through autumn. As one golden leaf fell on top of another bloodied leaf, I stopped. Nature was telling me a story. I looked to the river. There flowed a sub-plot. I looked to the sky. There hung a character. I listened to the distant ducks. Their quacks were part of Nature's story, too.

Read articles, write books. Watch films, write novels. Listen to radio plays, write poetry. If you enjoy writing, let the world influence you into doing it in whichever way feels right. Read. Definitely read. But know that where Nature has leaves, rivers, sky and ducks, you have words. And it's up to you to craft them into something that you and your reader enjoy. It's your chance to create.

Have fun on the journey.

What is the point of you?

2010-11-02T14:37:00.001Z

A couple of weeks ago, Michael Wolff said this to me:

Instead of asking someone what they do, I ask them what they are for. What is the point of you?

Michael was talking about businesses (not about me). There are millions of businesses with millions of names and identities and brands and voices across our planet. And Michael wants to sit them all down and ask them that question. What is the point of you? Why do you do what you do?

Today, I visited Trelissick Gardens near the Fal estuary in Cornwall (above you'll see a photo from the woodland trail that I walked along). I went there to open my eyes to nature, and then read about it through the words of Roger Deakin (in Wildwood). I stood queueing for a cup of tea. And I started speaking with an elderly lady who'd also just walked, with her friend and their dogs, around the woodland trail.

Dorothy visited the V&A last week. She didn't like to see all the young children running around ('How can children of that age appreciate what they see?'). I said I'd recently helped put together 26 Treasures at the V&A: 'an exhibition of words'. She asked if I was a writer. I said I was. She asked what I wrote. I said travel stories, and words for businesses that struggle to communicate with their staff and their customers.

Dorothy didn't ask me Michael's question. But I wish she had.

Because I might've struggled to answer it. It's easy to tell someone what you do for a living. It's easy to tell someone when you do it, where you do it, even how you do it. But why you do it?

There are lots of writers out there. There are lots of branded businesses out there, too. But there aren't many people out there, in business or in life, who'll tell you why they do what they do.

I think I write because I've seen how language, when respected and cared for, can move people in ways they might not have expected. Maybe one day I'll find out if that's really the reason.

So, why do you do what you do?

just speak to me

2010-10-25T10:20:00.000+01:00

I dabble in all sorts of writing. At the moment, I write mostly for businesses and try to help them communicate more clearly with you, as a customer or as a member of their teams.

As I explained to a room of directors and employees from some big UK businesses last week at a breakfast briefing - when I asked the final question to a panel of branding experts, including Michael Wolff - I don't come from the business writing world. I find it difficult to speak in brand analysis, value propositions. I struggle to call myself a copywriter.

These days, businesses seem more interested in the way they communicate. They may not get it right all the time (take 'value proposition'), but they think about what they're saying. They're conscious of voice.

Collins defines 'voice' as the 'natural and distinctive tone of the speech sounds characteristic of a particular person'.

It's the sound we make when we speak. It's the words we use. It's the undulation of our tone, the rhyme in our lines. The choice to twist a turn of phrase, the decision to omit or include, to run on or to break. Or to go silent.

After the breakfast briefing last week, somebody asked to speak to me. They complimented me on the delivery of my final question. And at that moment I realised just how important voice is: not just in business communication or even just in writing, but in life.

If you must speak in value proposition, please at least explain to me - in your own voice - what it means. That way, I reckon we'll understand each other better.

Mind your language

2010-10-17T20:20:00.001+01:00

I'm attending a networking event on Wednesday morning.

What a horrible sentence. Why's it horrible? Because it turns something warm and sociable into something stuffy and business-like. It sounds like it's been written by a machine, not a human.

What I'm actually doing Wednesday is getting up very early, hopping on a Central line train, going to Covent Garden, and joining a discussion about the importance of language in business.

This breakfast gathering is called 'Mind your language!' It's about tone of voice and brand language. It's all to do with phrases like 'I'm attending a networking event on Wednesday morning'.

Wednesday morning is a chance to listen to people who understand the importance of good communication. It's a chance for other people to learn from these people. There's an opportunity to question the role of words in businesses.

Michael Wolff will be there. And marketing chiefs and creative chaps from Linguabrand, Clifford Chance and Further.

Every day I read sentences written by businesses. Every time I do, I ask myself - and then my client - why they've written that sentence like that, used that word instead of another word. I challenge people to do things well instead of flawlessly execute objectives. I ask why they tell customers to reactivate their devices when they can just turn their phones back on. I even ask them if they're looking for a tone of voice, or just trying to use words that their customers understand.

I enjoy books when they grip me. I watch films when I believe the characters and empathise with them. I read adverts when a company is telling me something I want to know in a way that's interesting, entertaining, educational and persuasive. Write like a machine? I doubt I'll read it all.

I'm popping to Covent Garden before the sun rises Wednesday morning. There's a gathering at breakfast. We're going to discuss how words can move people, even in business.

I can't wait to learn new things.

The writer's art

2010-10-10T19:01:00.001+01:00

Standing and speaking to hundreds of people takes guts. Standing and speaking to those people and engaging and entertaining them takes wit, charm, knowledge, charisma and confidence.

On Saturday, the author and journalist Howard Jacobson wrote an article in the Independent about piers. On Thursday 21st October, he stands and speaks to a room of people in the British Library about words.

His talk is called 'The writer's art'.

Here's a man who's clearly as comfortable sitting in the corner of a lamp-lit room writing a novel as he is speaking to hundreds of people from a stage.

Which got me thinking.

I'd call Howard a writer, rather than an author and journalist, as the Independent does. I've looked up write in my dictionary to see where the word comes from. I'd never have guessed. It's from the Old English, meaning to scratch runes into bark. So that's to communicate something to someone else by scratching an old form of letters into a tree. We now use letters, words and paper or screens instead of runes and bark. But the ambition is the same.

Writing is just a way of communicating something to someone else.

And a writer's job is to do that in the most entertaining and arresting way he or she can.

On Saturday, Howard entertained me and his Independent readers with stories of Eugenius Birch, the Victorian who designed 14 of Britain's seaside piers. In a couple of weeks, he'll tell people about his writing life at the British Library. Over the last year or so, he's written his Booker-Prize-nominated novel, The Finkler Question.

Why?

Because he likes to tell stories. He likes to entertain, engage and persuade. He can do that through novels, scripts, articles, short stories, pamphlets. He can do it from a page in a book or a stage in a library. He can put the words onto paper or speak them into a microphone.

If you gave him some bark and a rock, he could probably tell you a story with that as well.

Writers communicate by sharing stories. The best writers do it very well, with whatever medium they have.

* * *

Read Howard's pier article here.

If you enjoy it, come along to his speech at the British Library on Thursday 21st October. You can get a ticket here.

Back to school

2010-10-03T20:03:00.000+01:00

In late 2008, I flirted with the idea of becoming a primary school teacher. Government was crying out for male teachers.

I started the application process for a postgraduate certificate of education (PGCE). I spent a month in two primary schools, sitting in with children, helping as a teaching assistant, and taking some small groups for the occasional creative writing workshop.

I enjoyed the workshops. For about half an hour at a time, I'd take two or three children into a room with an interactive whiteboard, wifi internet, projectors and Macs. And I'd give them a few pieces of paper and a few ideas about writing. Little exercises to do to free up their thinking, little techniques to use to give their sentences more life, more bounce. All to make writing fun instead of lesson.

The paperwork I saw in that month - from the PCGE application to the forms on teachers' desks - put me off becoming a teacher. But the workshops I taught filled me with pride, happiness, excitement and hope.

In the summer I wrote a play for a primary school in Edmonton. Ofsted had been asking the teachers for more paperwork than usual. It'd left no time to write and rehearse the end-of-term Year 6 play. I stepped in when my good friend Lauren, the head of the year, mentioned their predicament.

They rehearsed my words in two weeks and put on a great show for their parents.

After, Lauren asked if I'd like to be their guest writer. I said yes.

Last week, I started chatting with Lauren about how I might teach some creative writing workshops at her school. Schools these days talk in Levels and Achievements. They teach nouns and verbs, modals and otherwise, they teach grammar, phrases and clauses, and they sit nine year olds through all the other boring-sounding building blocks too. They forget to say how fun words can be.

In the new year, I'm hoping to start teaching these children that words can do amazing things. That everybody everywhere uses them every day to communicate.

I don't want to change the world. Just inspire the children who'll listen to me to play with words and enjoy being creative with them.

26 Treasures starts today

2010-09-18T12:59:00.006+01:00

You know what it's all about.

And today you can see it in the flesh. At the V&A. Or on the website.

www.26treasures.com

I'd recommend going to the Museum. Heading to the British Galleries 1500-1760. Strolling around and finding the 26 red labels with 26 sestudes* from writers around the country, including historical novelist Sara Sheridan and man of words John Simmons. Watch the video. And spend a little time being inspired by 21st-century reflections on objects from history.

26 Treasures is unique. An exhibition of words during the London Design Festival. It starts today. It finishes next Sunday. Just nine days to enjoy. Please pop along if you like words, design, history, people, stories...

* sestude - a reflective study inspired by an object, using exactly 62 words

Writing for 26 Treasures

2010-08-30T13:35:00.007+01:00

26 Treasures continues to grow. And grow. And attract attention from lots of very important people. Here's our latest blog post. I wrote it this morning. Thought I'd share here because I like Randy's and Jin Li's creation so much.

Two's a pair

On 24th September, 26 Treasures will spend an evening at the V&A. Some of the 26 writers will invite visitors to take a stroll around our exhibition. The V&A calls these little treats ‘Lates’. Every Friday, they encourage people to come along after work and spend some time in history. They’ve called the Late we’re getting involved in ‘Two’s a Pair’. Which got me thinking.

26 Treasures is made of pairs. John Simmons and I worked together to flesh out the idea. I worked with Dan Oparison to create the proposal. Soon we’d given 26 writers an object to write about. 26 objects, 62 words. We then gave each writer an editor.

Everything came paired.

Then, earlier this month, something very special turned up in the 26 Treasures inbox. It came from two people. Randy Yeo and Lim Jin Li. A creative partnership, designer and writer. It was this. About a very important pairing of people.

click on the image to zoom - if that takes you to another page, click again

Randy is a Typography student at the London College of Communication. Jin Li studies History at the London School of Economics. Randy’s tutor challenged him to respond to the 26 Treasures brief. He paired his design skills with Jin Li’s writing to produce something unique.

Their poster is a beautiful example of words and design. And it shows something very important. That although words can move a reader and design can touch a viewer, words and design together can often provoke a deeper response.

If you’d like to read Randy’s and Jin Li’s thoughts behind their piece, click here

www.26treasures.com

Words.

2010-08-17T21:44:00.000+01:00

I've been cheating. Posting videos and pictures on my website instead of writing words.

I have been writing words. Just not for myself. I've been writing them for these fine people.

26 Treasures. You know the project. The one that started as an idea in January when I read the article that sparked something that led to the chat with the 26 man who liked the idea and pitched it to the London festival, who pitched it to the big museum in the city. Since that day, little 26 Treasures has become very big 26 Treasures. This week we're designing the pamphlet that will be available the week of the London Design Festival.

That's 18-26 September.

We're also organising a special evening at the V&A, where we hope some of our writers will read their 62-word reflections while standing by their treasures. That should be Friday 24 September.

The website looks great www.26treasures.com

This will grow over the summer as every Wednesday we publish stories about our writers and their treasures, and every day from tomorrow we publish a reflection by other writers who showed an interest in the project.

Tomorrow there's a nice piece about a statue of Eve. Then Thursday it's the Mansion of Bliss.

This is my first week in about six months where I won't be able to dedicate a whole day to this project. Why? Because I'm working with The Writer in London.

John Simmons - a man I hope I can now call my friend, as well as my unofficial mentor - is the director of brand language at The Writer. His many books about writing for business decorate the shelves. John recommended me to Anelia. Anelia told Adam about me. Adam sent me a challenge. The rest, as they say, is quite interesting but rather detailed.

This week I'm working on a juicy project with lots of words.

So I've been writing a lot but not much for myself. Does that matter? Yes. To me. To keep my writing creative, I need to write personal things. Like blog posts. Like the occasional tweet. Like the script I owe my agent, the short stories, the comedy sketch.

I will write these other bits. And they'll charge me for my next business writing challenge. Which will get me ready for more scriptwriting.

And the cycle will continue.

I like this writing life.

This should say it all

2010-08-07T12:34:00.002+01:00

Hope you can make it.

www.26treasures.com

Time Waits For No-one

2010-07-31T09:12:00.003+01:00

Time flies.

If you've got any spare in the next couple of weeks, visit the arc gallery on the Barge Belle, floating on the River Lee in Tottenham.

Photographer Mary Osinibi has found time to exhibit some of her photographs. Each tells a story about a moment in time. Using traditional techniques, Mary's captured some cracking shots. Subtle, ghostly, always absorbing, she welcomes viewers into the scene and leaves them there to wander, wonder, ponder.

Here's my favourite photo from the exhibition. Time is clearly of the essence in New York this day. Saggy skin tells tales of years of busy days.

If you fancy a little time by the river, lost in time, make time to see Mary's exhibition. It won't last forever.

Here's Mary's website

And here's arc's website - arc isn't easy to find but it's worth the search.

Rhyming Simon's Time Machine

2010-07-22T21:41:00.000+01:00

They did brilliantly (see post below for this to make sense).

Lots of parents turned up. The teachers watched the children perform with smiles on their faces. There were smiles all round in fact. Most kids remembered most lines. Some started laughing in the middle of the performance. They danced like professionals. They sang like it was their last ever performance for their school.

One little chubby chap with thick, curly hair shouted his lines like he was performing outdoors on the windiest day of the year. Then when he had to sing he sang with his left hand. First it clicked, then patted, then it squeezed into a fist. And then it moved up to his chest and touched his heart as he boomed some lines of 'Radio Ga Ga' into the audience.

I'm so happy I played my part.

There's now talk of me teaching some creative writing workshops at the school next year. Wouldn't it be great to encourage a love of the language at an age when children start to draft and sketch their futures? Great for 10 and 11 year olds to learn to play with words, run away with words, rhyme, keep time, just enjoy their words?

And what a privilege to be the person they learn from.

Getting drunk and writing scripts

2010-07-19T20:13:00.000+01:00

About a month ago, I went to my cousin's wedding. I had a few glasses of wine. I chatted to my other cousin's girlfriend. Everything she said sounded so true. I had more wine. Wow, this young lady knew her stuff. A beer. All of a sudden she was like a goddess. Another beer. 'I'll do anything you ask.'

She jokingly asked if I'd like to write a school play.

Lauren is head of Year 6 at a primary school in north London. The area is quite deprived and the kids come from across the world. They're great kids, she told me, but sometimes it's quite tricky to get them to engage. This year, for the Year 6 leaving assembly, Lauren decided that the final year children should do something on their final day at school to mark this event. I agreed (before the dancing began).

For their school play, she wanted the five Year 6 classes to put on a time-travel comedy adventure drama with a Willy Wonka-esque character, songs and dance, lots of dialogue and action for lots of children. And it all had to focus on five inventions: papyrus, the printing press, the telephone, the television and the internet.

A week after the wedding, 'I'll do anything you ask' felt a little like a lingering hangover.

Though after tomorrow night, I think I'll be very proud of a lot of little people.

Tomorrow, Year 6 will perform 'Rhyming Simon's Time Machine' for mums and dads, brothers and sisters, for teachers, for me, and of course for themselves. I spoke to Lauren a few days ago and the kids were 'good with some parts, rusty on others'. It doesn't matter. As long as they enjoy themselves.

This is the first time I've written a script and not directed it myself. I'm stupidly excited to see what happens...

I didn't win but...

2010-07-12T11:03:00.001+01:00

A couple of weeks ago I entered a writing competition. Then I found out I was ineligible to enter. So here's my story.

The challenge - Write about 'the West'. In any way and in any form.

The Evening Star

easterlies fly west
towards the wise evening star
safe in the spring sky

‘Just tell me what you want.’ Her voice shivered. ‘You have never told me. That is why this has happened.’
    Outside the windows the cool spring sun was casting evening shadows on the flat Georgian offices. Ori watched as the shadows grew. He watched as an evening wind flipped a newspaper out of reach of the seller.
    ‘It’s a zephyr,’ he said, staring out at the London pedestrians. ‘A zephyr brings news. Flips it, twists it, so we can’t read the messages.’
    After saying these words to Helen, he wrote them on her napkin in curving strokes under the title ‘Zephyr’.
    ‘Is this another of your poems?’
    He didn’t look up. When he’d finished caressing the soft curve of the final ‘s’, he put his red-and-white biro back into his jacket’s inside pocket with the napkin and looked at the wind as it swept dust through West Kensington.
    ‘It is not like it was,’ she said, staring at him.
    ‘Have you seen the shadows?’ he asked.
    ‘I love the shadows, Ori,’ the girl said.
    ‘They’re coaxing people home,’ he continued.
    She didn’t look outside with him. Instead she looked at the restaurant manager sitting and counting receipts across the empty room.
    ‘You are cold, Ori. You are so cold.’
     ‘In half an hour,’ he said, ‘the sun will go home, the moon will rise. You should see the light now. It’s like a dimmed bulb in cobwebs and dust.’
    She looked at the right side of his sharp face, dirty with dark stubble.
    ‘Is that one?’ she asked. ‘Another one? Because I do not get it. Is that what you are trying to do to me?’
    He just stared. ‘Hespera – that’s what the Greeks called distant Spain.’
   She hesitated before saying, ‘I was always called Hesperia to my mother. I do not know why.’
   He turned to her and smiled.
   Her face and arms were tan. Smooth, soft, young. But a measured, uniform brown. She turned to see Ori and as she did he again looked out of the windows of L’Ovest, at the people passing from left to right, right to left.
    ‘I have a lock up,’ she said. ‘Or if you could stay I could get a room.’
    ‘Where?’
    ‘West. Up West. We should stay West, if you want. But not our home. That is foreign to you.’
    He laughed. ‘And you say you’re not a poet.’
    She smiled. ‘The trains back across town will be hell tonight.’
    He turned and looked at the manager still counting receipts. Then he stood and walked across to him and spoke. Helen couldn’t see what made the manager smile because Ori’s back and his tight black hair were facing her.
    Soon he sat back in his chair and looked through the window.
    ‘What did you do?’ she asked.
    ‘Stepped closer,’ he said. ‘Tonight. It could be perfect. It could happen.’ He breathed deeply.
    ‘You don’t mean us, do you?’ she said.
    He watched as the same newspaper jumped from the street and stuck itself to the seller’s leg. The seller looked around, then kicked, then kicked again with more venom. It refused to move. It shivered in the wind.
    ‘What did you say to him?’
    He pulled the poetry napkin from his pocket and wrote. A title then thirteen words. A pattern of five syllables, seven syllables, five syllables.
    She read it. ‘Is that the one?’
    ‘I don’t know.’
    ‘Why don’t you know?’
    ‘I think you would’ve told me if it was.’
    A waiter stood by the table of the last couple in L’Ovest. He pushed a candle between them. It leaned away from Ori. Outside, the shadows were now surrounded in the cream of the newly-risen old moon. The wind continued to blow the news.
    ‘So will you stay?’ she asked.
    ‘A carafe of the Australian Cabernet Sauvignon,’ he said to the waiter.
    She mumbled something.
    The young man opposite her didn’t speak.
    ‘Signora?’
    ‘I was going to suggest the Merlot,’ she said.
    ‘It’s Chilean,’ said Ori. ‘Too dry, no emotion.’
    She didn’t say a word. The waiter brought them a carafe of Cabernet Sauvignon. It looked a pale red when the young man held it up to the long, curving candle.
    ‘So?’
    ‘The sun has set.’
    ‘Ori, talk to me. Tell me. I am your wife and I love you. You can tell me. What is this? What is between us?’
    ‘Nothing,’ he replied
    ‘Nothing?’
    He turned to face her, eye to eye.
    ‘Cold shadows, moonlight. A cool, mean-spirited wind.’ He paused. ‘A kind of deadness.’
    She sighed and looked through his window to darkness.
    ‘It’s dark outside. There aren’t any shadows. The moon doesn’t cast shadows. It is useless. Dull and useless.’
    ‘She is the sun of night-time.’
    ‘It. It is a rock,’ said Helen. ‘The wind is the wind – not a mythological bringer of bad news. Sunset is sunset, Ori. We are in a restaurant called L’Ovest in West Kensington and this is where our home is.’ She stopped and moved her hand to dry her eyes. But she didn’t dry them.
    One tear trickled onto her lip and sat there.
    ‘And I am your wife Helen. And we have only been married four months. And I’m so scared, Ori. I am so scared.’
    He cupped his hands over hers. The manager turned to see the young lady, with dark hair, sunset skin, weep into her husband’s hands.
    ‘You’ll never be everything I need.’
    She lifted her head.
    ‘In some ways it’s nothing. In other ways it’s too big.’
    ‘Is it me?’ she asked.
    He smiled and squeezed her hands. ‘There’s a world between us, Helen.’
    A drop of sweat rolled from his forehead to his lip. He wiped it away.
    ‘You said there was nothing between us.’
    He smiled. ‘Shall we stay together tonight?’ He stroked her hand. Then he stroked the tear from her lip.
    She withdrew.
    ‘I’m—’ She picked up her wine. ‘I am trying to wonder if I ever want to see you again.’ She put the wine back onto the table.
    ‘Stay with me tonight. Come back on the train,’ he said.
    ‘But you do not love me.’
    He looked outside. ‘I’m dead here. I’m too far from home.’
    The tears dried. Outside L’Ovest, he held her hand and kissed her. She closed her eyes and didn’t open them until he began to walk towards the station.
    Then she followed.

the answer

2010-07-10T12:16:00.000+01:00

More than just great tits

2010-07-01T13:06:00.001+01:00

I'm sitting in the garden reading. Reading a beautiful book about love, longing, lust and birds.

By the hairy comedian Rory McGrath.

I admit, I'm not a great reader. In that I don't read much - not that I can't say the big words. I read to learn about writing: rarely to enjoy a good story. When I do read a cracking story, I remember it. And I remember when I read it and where I was and why I was reading and who had recommended it.

Like Hemingway's stunningly simple 'Snows of Kilimanjaro' in San Jose while studying short stories with Prof Maio, the short, hunched Californian professor with the electrified silver hair and undulating voice.

And like JM Coetzee's Disgrace. A beautifully rich account of one man's battle with his desires. A look at relationships. A look at race, sex. Recommended by Simon Edwards at Roehampton University.

Like Charlie Connelly's Attention All Shipping. Narrative non-fiction near its best. Pacy, funny, fun and educational. My brother's choice. Now my book.

A few weeks ago I watched Rory McGrath on the BBC series 'Three Men In A Boat'. I Googled him for some reason. Perhaps I wanted to find his age. I couldn't guess it. I found www.beardedtit.co.uk.

a thoroughly educational, occasionally lyrical and highly amusing romp through the hidden byways of birdwatching

Sounded good. Memoir. Narrative non-fiction. My sort of thing. And Rory's a funny man on television. I went to Amazon and purchased.

But the point of this post isn't to say I'm reading a book that's good. It's to highlight the beauty of Rory McGrath's writing. Yes, that's right - Rory, the rude, brash, forward, hairy, laddish middle-aged man. The man writes beautifully. About life and love. As well as birds.

'Swift': what a great name for the world's fastest-flying bird too. Superb to watch in sociable groups on a summer's evening, whistling and screaming over the rooftops in death-defying acrobatics: black sickles of lightning.

They eat on the wing, they drink on the wing and they sleep on the wing. But there is more.

They make love on the wing. They mate in flight. Can you think of anything in the natural world that we could envy more?

They fly as high as they can into the air and then they drop down in their lovemaking with a dizzy, exhilarating, spiralling fairground ride, tearing themselves away from gravity at the last minute and back up again to repeat the breath-taking plunge of ecstasy.

We were motionless. The silence was ruined by the vast thumping of lovers' hearts.

The following daybreak was exceptional. Saturday morning must have been up all night preparing such a resplendent treat for me: a huge spread of tangerine sun and icy blue sky.

Someone's taking my bed

2010-06-24T11:03:00.000+01:00

Look what I found in my local free paper yesterday...

26 Treasures and my big bed - a story

2010-06-16T18:06:00.000+01:00

Over the next month, I need to write 62 words for 26 Treasures. About a bed. The Great Bed of Ware. Rather than just writing some words, I'll do as I always do with a piece of writing - I'll scribble and jot for hours, days. I'll draft then cross out then start again. Before crossing out again. And starting again again. But rather than keeping my process secret, as I usually do, I thought I'd share it here. So whenever I work on my 62 words, I'll record my journey on my blog. Then, when my piece appears in the V&A in September and you visit, you'll be able to say, 'Oh yeah, I know how he wrote that - he bored us silly with the process on his blog.'

So here goes. Here are some early thrown-together thoughts that will, by 15 July 2010, become my 62-word reflection.

Today, I met with fellow writer Gill in the V&A. After tea and cake, we walked through the British Galleries 1500-1760. Via sculptures, garish chandeliers, and the creepiest young man to ever offer me a map.

We reached The Great Bed of Ware, which I randomly paired myself with a few months ago.

First impressions. It's big. Hm - not a useful direction for my 62 words (pretty obvious).

I photographed, got close, stepped back, knelt, peered, squinted to read.

To read the initials carved into the platform of one of the ornate posts. I couldn't make out any names (other than AXI and TtBSLsquiggle). Who would scratch their name on such an amazing object from history? And why? To show they woz ere? To remember what (or who) they did here? Probably. Like an animal marking territory? Or maybe mindless graffiti. Who could I ask? Or had those stories been consumed by the bed?

Well who was the last person to sleep in this preserved bed? Preserved bed... hmm, why preserve a bed? It seems a waste. Surely a bed exists to keep us warm and safe and comfortable at night. When we're at our most vulnerable. It's our castle - especially a bed of this size, big enough to sleep at least ten people. More if they're like people from history, smaller than us, Gill pointed out.

And the little one said, roll over, as Olivia emailed the other day.

So everyone who's slept in this bed had a reason to do so. Some, who stopped in the inns and pubs of Hertfordshire (where/Ware this bed lived out its days, I think I read), just needed a place to kip. Some slept here to feel intimacy, love. From peasantry to royalty, perhaps it didn't matter.

I'm sure I once read that people sharing beds was a sign of poverty not intimacy in the past. Victorians would shack up with each other to keep warm, stay alive. Not for nights of canoodling.

So is the Great Bed of Ware a place of life? Full of living stories, of flesh, of conception? Or a place of retirement, death, preserved for us to marvel at but not enjoy?

I like the idea of living stories. Perhaps I can decipher some of the scratchings and find a story. Perhaps of a king? Or perhaps of a pauper, a man who shared the Great Bed of Ware through necessity rather than love.

I think this could be a lot of fun...

Big things are happening

2010-06-10T09:00:00.000+01:00

like

26 Treasures

Yesterday, I met with people from 26 (the writers’ organisation), the V&A (the hosts), the London Design Festival (the organisers) and Pentagram (the designers). We talked about this very exciting project, which has attracted attention from all over the country, from Scotland to Cornwall. Our writers are writing. Our editors (including me) are editing. Our web designer is branding and web designing.

Over the summer months, we’ll have a website to showcase all the responses to the huge variety of objects in the V&A.

And every day there’s a new development.

Moonwalking

Two Fridays ago, I sent an email to 150 people. I attached the introduction chapter to the email. I prefaced the introduction with this.

A preface

In January 2009, I set off on a year-long adventure. My aim was simple: to walk around thirteen parts of Great Britain by the light of the full moon. My reason for doing it was a bit more complicated.

And here it is - the reason. This is the first chapter of the book that never was. It reveals why one man would want to spend one year with one moon. What it fails to do is tell the whole story of my year. Of the moon-folk I met, the moon adventures I had. Of the Goddess, the artillery range, the Roman ghosts, the secret beach, the drunk Highlander, the Lost Gardens.

I’d like to make a deal with you, reader. If you reach the end of this introduction and you want more, please tell me. Email me. If 100 people ask me to write the rest of Moonwalking, I’ll write it. By the end of 2010, I’ll have captured 2009 in words.

Whether you then read my stories by Kindle or candle, published or unpublished, it won’t matter. I’ll have told the story of how one year of moonwalking changed my life. And that will make me happy.

Please save this pdf, print it, pass it on. Please share my story with anybody who’s curious.

Thank you
Rob

rsp@robertselfpierson.co.uk
www.discoveringbritainbyfullmoon.blogspot.com

Over 50 readers have replied so far asking to read more. Another 50 needed before I begin. Maybe. (Though the enthusiasm of the 50 has almost convinced me anyway.)

Cornwall

Last Friday, my creative partner Dan had an interview with University College Falmouth. He’d applied for a place on the Creative Advertising MA. Friday, he impressed the team enough for them to let him in.

So in October he’ll move to Falmouth. So in October I’ll move back to Cornwall – this time for business (and to reunite with old friends). We’ll work as a creative partnership in Cornwall and London (and Nigeria – we have a lot of overseas clients). It’s an opportunity to approach writing and design from a fresh direction. The south west.

So far we’ve said we’ll work on branding projects across Cornwall, paid and voluntary, I’ll work on local theatre projects, Dan will join Dott Cornwall, we’ll play and try to write music. I want to learn French, with a view to possibly working abroad in future. Dan will learn Cornish (that’s a lie).

We’ll do as much as possible in whatever time we have there.

Time to get (more) creative.

Yay, I can finally announce...

2010-05-25T17:57:00.002+01:00

Last week I wrote a brief. A creative brief. Possibly the first creative brief of this sort I've ever written. It's for something called '26 Treasures' - an exhibition of words that will take place inside the British Galleries 1500-1760 at the V&A in London in September, as part of the London Design Festival (LDF).

This is the thing I've been sharing in little chunks since January. And now that it's official, and really rather exciting, I can tell the story about how it all began.

On a slightly boring January afternoon, I was sitting in my armchair at home reading Twitter. Boring, boring, hmm, nope boring, boring. Boring. Soon I got frustrated reading my own boring tweets and opened a link posted by an artist called Mel McDonald. Mel and I became Twitter friends last year while I was travelling around Britain by full moon and she was photographing and painting my favourite part of Britain - Cornwall. In today's tweet, Mel had linked to an article from the Guardian website.

In 'Why Monet's art haunts my dreams', Jonathan Jones wrote:

Last night I dreamed about a painting. It was Claude Monet's Bathers at La Grenouillère (1869), on display at London's National Gallery. (Except that in my dream, it became a black-and-white photograph.) In this painting, people at leisure are glimpsed in a spatter of dancing light: a group of three figures stand on a jetty, fragmented silhouettes against the brightness, while boats, bodies and water flicker hauntingly in the haze.

There I was, in body, sitting beside a window in Waltham Abbey, Essex, a few miles north of London, under grey sky, reading a website article written by a man, probably in London, probably sitting near a window, probably under a grey sky, typing words onto a computer screen. But there I was, in my mind, somewhere in golden France, gazing at people at leisure, spatters of dancing light, fragmented silhouettes, water flickering hauntingly in the haze. I could hear excited children run through crisp grass, hear boats tied to a rickety jetty bobbing and nudging each other. I could smell summer.

And in my head something happened. An idea arrived, triggered by this paragraph, by Jonathan, by Monet, by my senses, my imagination. I sent a message to Mel - 'Thank you, you've just given me an idea'. I emailed my creative design partner Dan (you can see the email here). And I got so excited, so charged, so fearful of the idea I'd just had, my eyes filled.

Copy Is Art.

Copy is art. It seemed so simple. In just 71 words, somebody had painted an image for me. It didn't matter that I didn't know Bathers at La Grenouillère; Jonathan Jones's perfect choice of words had put a beautiful painting into a place beyond images. Imagination.

I work in words every day. In business, people call words 'copy'. In 'copywriting', a lot of businesses call copy 'content'. In content we have images, actions, beliefs, thoughts, emotions, fears, passions, verbs and adjectives and concrete nouns and abstract nouns and lists and scenes and journeys and relationships and characters and smells and textures and-- we have all this condensed into one word. One lifeless word.

But as I sat at Grenouillère, mothers trying to control Jacque and Florence and Claude and Laurent, the boats paddling on Jonathan's flickering water, I understood the power of words. In books, in scripts, in poetry, in letters, emails, posters, websites - and especially in business. And I realised that copy isn't content, it's art.

I sent a Twitter message to John Simmons. And in a show of utter immodesty, I told him I'd had a good idea that he might be interested in hearing about.

Within a week or two, we were sitting in a gallery in London, sipping tea and coffee, eating cake, and talking words and art. I showed him a proposal I'd created. On one page I put this

I tried to do to JMW Turner's Fighting Temeraire what Jonathan Jones had done to Monet's waterside scene.

John liked the idea. He said 26 would be interested. He said the LDF might be interested. He asked me to create a proposal for the LDF. With the help of Dan, I did.

Over the next couple of weeks, Copy Is Art developed into 26 Treasures (as John poured his creativity into the idea). As the LDF embraced the project, and then together John and Ben from the LDF successfully pitched it to the V&A, works of art became artefacts, objects, treasures: pieces of history showcased in the museum. 'A number of treasures' became '26 treasures'. And a small idea inspired by reading a small paragraph became part of an international exhibition.

Before we could catch breath, Maura Dooley and Andrew Motion had become two of our 26 writers. And then the LDF highlighted 26 Treasures as one of the top four projects in this year's festival (out of 200).

So last week's brief went out to 26 writers. These writers have been randomly paired with an object in the British Galleries in the V&A - a delicate locket, an 18th-century bust of Homer, Mr Nobody with a Drinking Glass, and more. And in just 62 words (remember Jonathan conjured his images in just 71), we're asking these writers to reflect and respond. But here's the twist.

We're not looking for anything dry, descriptive, historical. We want to know what these treasures mean to the people who are writing about them. We've called this project '26 Treasures' because each object chosen is a treasure - to the museum, to the country, to a collection, to a collector, and, most importantly, to the people who shared their lives with it. We want writers to treasure these pieces and let them into their lives.

Here's the piece I wrote and designed for the proposal to the V&A

On Saturday 18th September 2010, the V&A will host 26 Treasures. They'll invite everybody to come and see the treasures, read the words, and feel inspired. 26 Treasures will ask an international audience to take an hour out of their busy lives to do nothing more than reflect.

And perhaps, through the power, the beauty, the endless possibilities of loved words, we'll be able to take visitors on some journeys: through the museum, through our writers' imaginations, and through history.

it's not all log fires, red wine, storytelling and manor houses

2010-05-17T20:21:00.000+01:00

Last week, it was all log fires, red wine, storytelling and manor houses.

Up there in Northumberland, with the sheep. And the writers.

My time at Highgreen gave me a lovely opportunity to reflect. More than I have for months, since the moon invited me to lie back and think on the secret beach in Cornwall.

Highgreen allowed me to play with words, sentences, with structure, sounds, meanings. Once I even left a page blank (because I'm crazy like that).

Language, I find, is a wonderful thing. Really? Surely it's just words?

Those sentences above are mainly fragments. Chunks, chips, bits, bobs. Strung together, perhaps a little rough, a little raw. But there's a reason behind each. There's a reason why each word above exists: both in this post and in our lives. Each is a character. It survives by itself but when it's with complementary words it excels. It raises its head.

Last week in Northumberland, with the sheep and the writers, I learned that writing needn't be a solitary pursuit. In fact, it's often more enjoyable in collaboration. A writer can survive by himself, but he has the opportunity to be a better writer when there are others around.

So the next time somebody says I'm lucky to be a writer, it must be lovely, I might not pity myself for the loneliness, the isolation, and I might nod and say, You know, it's log fires, red wine, storytelling, manor houses. And I'm very lucky.

Thank you
John&
Stuart&
Betti&
Laura&
Rona&
Meg&
Rowena&
Mandy&
Gillian

Keep writing

make yourself feel comfortable

2010-05-12T14:06:00.000+01:00

I'm writing this post while travelling to Northumberland on a train.

I'm heading to Highgreen Manor, which lies somewhere in the heart of the Northumberland National Park. There I'm spending two days writing. With other writers and people from business who will sit and listen to John Simmons and Stuart Delves from Dark Angels and absorb some of their experience and their teachings.

Last year, I travelled the country. And every time I did I took with me something familiar - an old bag, a comfortable book, a favourite pen, a scribbled notepad, a sketch. Something that would give me that sense of home, the known, while travelling.

This morning I thought about what I'd brought with me today for my few days in Highgreen (camera, laptop, favourite jumper). And I thought about how valuable the familiar can be - far beyond monetary value. And how even the smallest piece of the familiar can allow somebody to adventure and search for the unfamiliar.

This all seems to connect nicely to writing. Whenever I write something, I look over notes to familiarise myself with what I already have, what I've already written. Sometimes it's just a sentence, a sense of what a piece of writing may become. But that little something - those words I've written before - instantly give me a sense of comfort, of knowing. And they allow me to push myself in my writing.

Take earlier on this train. I continued to develop a script I've been asked to write by my agent. When I first had the idea for the story, about six months ago, I wrote down a page of notes. When I wrote the outline to show my agent, I first reread my earliest notes, earliest scrawls. Now today, developing the idea into a script, I keep returning to what I know - from what I've written before. Not because I've forgotten what the idea is, but because I get a sense of comfort from the familiar. The thing that went before. Which allows me to branch off into lots of different directions in the knowledge that I can always come back to what I know.

Think about music, writing, films. Think about your favourites. And think how you feel when you hear or read or see that favourite again, after years.

It can make you feel warm inside, safe when you're far away from home.

Small town, big ideas

2010-05-08T19:26:00.000+01:00

Yesterday, dan&rob met Tricia from the King Harold Day Society of Waltham Abbey.

Waltham Abbey is my hometown. I've lived here - on and off - for 25 and a half years. And I've seen things go downhill. Not everything. I mean we now have a Lidl opposite a Tesco. And there's a Sainsbury's depot nearby.

OK, they're quite bad things. Supermarkets have helped suck the life out of the heart of Waltham Abbey, out of the main high street, Sun Street. Which lies on the Greenwich Meridian.

Yep, the heart of Waltham Abbey is also the heart of the world.

Tricia, the lady we met, organises King Harold Day. Once a year, over 6,000 visitors come to my town to see the place where King Harold, the last Anglo-Saxon king of England, is buried. Behind the church, consecrated by Harold 950 years ago. Near the wonky pubs and shops of the old Tudor town. Beside the River Lee. Within a bell's ring of Tennyson's 'Wild Bells'.

Harold's story is one of courage, strength and passion.

Waltham Abbey's story is one of dying shops, supermarkets and dangerous Friday nights. But no. No no no. Waltham Abbey has so much more to offer.

While Mr Brown and Mr Clegg and Mr Cameron argued and tried to make a deal to run the country and clean up small towns and engage youth and repair the economy and all that stuff, Tricia drank tea with dan&rob and started to plan ways to attract more visitors to Waltham Abbey this October.

By highlighting the heroism of King Harold.

Inviting the youth of the town to get involved.

And by trying to do something to enhance what is already a fantastic event that shows how the passion of a few people - or sometimes even one person - can bring thousands together in the name of pride and courage.

This is Macclesfield's fantastic Barnaby Festival.

Watch this space for Waltham Abbey's fantastic King Harold Day. Then join us...

if Ken Dodd can do it...

2010-05-01T15:25:00.000+01:00

I nearly blogged about bad things today.

About companies who play silly games when trying to get writers to write nice things for them. About agencies who mismanage and then blame their writers and designers for the resulting problems. About not having enough experience for companies to trust me when I say ‘You’re positioning your brand all wrong’.

But I thought better of it.

Instead I’m going to write about three nice things that make me smile when I think about them.

Number 1 – a 26 exhibition

In September 2010, an idea I had in January, which started like this…

…will become an exhibition in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, as part of the London Design Festival. This is only happening because of the support, creativity and kindness of a man named John. John is a founder of the writers’ organisation 26.

In September, my words (alongside 25 other writers’ words) will appear beside artefacts in one of the most loved museums in the country.

Number 2 – being creative for the sake of it

I like being creative. For fun. I’ve always sketched and painted, scribbled and jotted, written stories, made strangely-shaped paper planes, turned cardboard boxes into smaller cardboard boxes. I’ve tried writing music, designing football shirts, devising board games.

At the moment, I’m working on a clothes label (as in a label that hangs from clothes). Design and words.

This is lovely because it’s a project for myself. No brief, no structure, no client. Just design, have fun, and try to solve a problem with something creative.

Number 3 – the idea that most people are nice

There are lots of people on this earth. And there are millions of stories written about them. About how most of them are evil, nasty. How murderers love to stroll the streets picking off the unsuspecting. How children are sleeping with drunk drugs. How terrorists are planning to blow me up with a bomb.

So here’s a nice thing.

Most people.

Last week in Falmouth, a friend put me up for the week. And he put my design partner – whom he’d never met before – up for a week. And he invited us back down any time.

This morning, a lovely grey lady let me out into traffic when nobody else would. If this were a post about bad things, I’d write about those selfish people. But I’d rather write about Maggie (her name probably isn’t Maggie). Because she smiled and waved at me. Then when I thanked her and smiled, she thanked me and smiled.

Which made me feel much better about the show-off in the 4x4, who didn’t even take the time to look at me before dismissing my desire to drive along in front of him for five minutes.

Also today I texted a happy-birthday message to a good friend. He wasn’t expecting it. He replied that he loved me – which, considering he’s married and expecting his first child, probably isn’t true in the usual sense. But I know what he meant and his happy message made me laugh.

People can be selfish, forgetful, spiteful, careless, brash, tactless, mean. They can call other people bigots behind their backs. But, as a rule, most of us are pretty ok.

Congratulations, Rob and Danielle.

Maggie, have a lovely day.

A week in Falmouth

2010-04-24T20:48:00.000+01:00

There are few things better than writing. One of them is not writing.

I've been in Falmouth, Cornwall, all week. I've met up with good friends, been to theatre productions, walked miles and miles along blustery beaches. I've enjoyed beers, wine, fresh food. The sun has shone all week. The air has been chilly, refreshing. Cats have attacked birds, seagulls have fought. And I've taken lots of photos of people smiling.

Every part of this week has fed me stories. Interesting, intriguing, captivating, scary, worrying, hilarious stories.

But I haven't written them down.

I've lived them. And smiled.

Because sometimes I write my best pieces in my head, without paper and pen or laptop to get in the way. Sometimes it's just living and being happy that improves my writing.

Writing that I can do on a rainy day.

dan&rob - creative team

2010-04-17T12:55:00.000+01:00

We've done it.

Decided to work together as a creative team. Officially.

Rob Self-Pierson and Daniel Oparison. No egos or pretentiousness. Just a writer and a designer working together on projects, some paid, some voluntary.

Always giving everything.

Like yesterday at the Newspaper Society's Young Team of the Year in Islington, London. And working with John Simmons to pitch a project to the London Design Festival and the V&A. When meeting with the King Harold Day Society in the coming weeks. For the Chip Show Awards. When thanking Michael Wolff with something a bit different.

And whatever else happens in future.

Because branding and advertising and writing and design and online and print and non-fiction and illustration and anything else creative aren't about business and marketing.

It's just people and relationships.

If you'd like to see our portfolio, please drop me an email

West Kensington > Loughton

2010-04-09T10:00:00.000+01:00

tonight on the tube i saw the girl with white hair and pink scarf stare at the gay man with his best friend who bumped into the man who stared at his ipod while the man opposite played sudoku while the boy at mile end carried carpet upstairs and the man in the train read how to beat stress and the man who wouldn't sit smiled at me as i glanced at the lad who looked just like nige as his girlfriend alighted and the daughter of the asian couple let her eyelids win and the man with the tash flirted with the giggly lady and the guy with his long hair stared at himself and the russian lady smiled at her friend while the chap from china vaselined his finger and was replaced by the indian mother with suitcase and stern look and the fat man in the suit slept and the young girl wept near the african grandfather beside the pretty tanned girl and the elderly lady sat like a corpse and the couple ate minstrels and crunched beside the man who watched it all

and smiled

You want drama, I'll give you drama

2010-04-07T16:06:00.000+01:00

During 2008, I lived in Falmouth, Cornwall. I studied a Masters in Professional Writing at University College Falmouth. I enjoyed myself. And I had a lovely opportunity to work throughout the summer with James Henry, a script writer for the BBC and Channel 4 and others inbetween.

I worked on a script called GOING SOMEWHERE. A real-time sitcom about the relationships of six work colleagues, and how they grow and fall apart over one evening.

A couple of people from the television industry saw my script and series outline.

Not enough drama. Not funny enough.

Not great for a sitcom.

Yesterday, I got the green light to start work on a new sitcom idea for my agent. So today I started planning. And I've learned a lot in the last couple of years.

This new idea has started with a drama/comedy board. Something I've devised to highlight the serious bits and the funny bits of the series.

Feedback is great. As long as you learn from it.

Carridin - ask them anything (about business and the law)

2010-04-02T15:58:00.001+01:00

Still writing.

This time a stunning website for a new business and legal advice company called Carridin. After some chats with Dan O from D'mastermind, and lots of thought about the right tone of voice and level of language for a company emerging in this industry with a clear, bright, bold and confident visual identity, we worked together to create the site.

First feedback? Very positive.

Great design as always from Dan O.

Lots of enthusiasm from the client.

It's projects like this that make writing for business a pleasure.

In the beginning...

2010-03-26T09:58:00.002Z

Over the last few weeks, I've been watching the BBC documentary 'Inside John Lewis'.

They've got this bloke called John Lewis right, and this endoscope, and-

No, actually this isn't one of those extreme 5ive-style programmes, sensationalist and overly dramatic. The series focused on department store John Lewis and its 2009 turnaround, from a big decrease in turnover to signs of growth.

With profits crumbling during the recession, someone somewhere realised something needed to be done. In fact, the brand realised. It was out of touch, too niche. Or it thought itself niche - in an ever-growing market.

They took many strides to improve public image. One of which meant working with an exciting, emerging London creative agency called adam & eve.

The agency did well. Very well. They clearly thought outside the department store industry. Even outside the creative industry. Most of their ideas impressed the marketing manager at John Lewis. Most ran. Some appeared on the streets of Cardiff, towering above the heads of locals and visitors who had come from miles around to visit the new flagship store. Why did they visit? Largely due to the advertising, I'd say.

I'm against the 'hard sell'. There's nothing worse than being told what to do. For many of us, that's the catalyst for doing the opposite. Though many managers believe that unless you tell a customer to 'Buy it now', they won't think to purchase the product they see advertised.

No.

A product sells itself, providing it's good enough. Great service sells itself. A creative agency (or a copywriter, or designer, or developer) exists to make that product or service look or sound as good as it is - perhaps on a website, a billboard, a newspaper ad. A challenge. But a healthy, moral challenge.

Here's an example. adam & eve took a John Lewis chair. An ordinary chair. Excellent quality, sturdy. The sort you'd sit on. But lacking something. They hired a skilled photographer. He crouched beside the chair and shot upwards. He lit the chair beautifully. Perspective created grandeur.

The chair was a good chair. The photograph that sat on the ad was an excellent photograph.

adam & eve did the same with different products - highlighting the personality of each.

But they didn't write 'Buy our chairs - they're grand'. Or 'Buy the iPhone from us - it's beautiful'. The agency created grand, created beautiful.

My job as writer (and practising designer) is to show a customer a product at its best. Show its class, its elegance, or its playfulness, perhaps its reliability, its ability to make your day ten times easier, your phonecalls clearer.

It's not my job to tell you to buy something, because chances are you'll do the opposite.

Hats off to you, adam & eve.

And well done, John Lewis.

T-weet t-woo

2010-03-22T17:19:00.000Z

Well, it appears I just wrote my most interesting tweet in months.

What a way to go out.

This morning, I broke the news that I was leaving Twitter. Why leave now? One main reason: because I didn't feel I had enough to say to warrant sharing my little news with 280 people.

A few disagreed.

Some feel it's the little details in our lives that make Twitter interesting. That it's the stories of bad games of tennis that make Twitter what it is - or as Mike Reed (@Mikebreed) says: 'The mundane is critical to Twitter. (Twittical? Let's not.) And what I love is that so few tweets are "Playing tennis" or "Boiling the kettle". Mostly, the author comments - "Not very well, by the way", or "If I don't get coffee now, I will expire."'

I see this argument. It's a fine argument. And I love that some people follow me because they like to hear how I spend my Sunday mornings. But I've realised something. That since I stopped writing about my travels, my follower count has frozen, and I haven't enjoyed sharing my life anywhere near as much.

My approach to Twitter has always been, 'If I'm doing something that others haven't done, or wouldn't do, then it's worth tweeting about.' And over the weekend I broke that rule for the last time.

But for those who've offered such kind words, fear not. As I hinted in the last post, I'm sure I'll return to Twitter. Not as a lunatic, but as a traveller with a new goal, a new quest.

I have to set myself new challenges. Whether I succeed or fail, it doesn't matter. As long as I commit.

What I've learned from Twitter, I haven't learned from the Twitter system. Not from the 140 characters alone. The biggest joy has come from meeting the people behind the tweets. I've enjoyed lunch, dinner, beers, weekends moonwalking, long chats into the night with people I've met through Twitter. And I hope that my next challenge will interest just as many people, if not more. And encourage more lunches, dinners and beer.

Twitter has opened doors to wonderful things. I received my first piece of freelance copywriting through it, and my first magazine commission. It helped me launch a worldwide moonwalking campaign for the 31.12.09 bluemoonwalk. It's allowed me to chat with people in America, India, Australia, Ireland and Paignton.

As @waxingmoonman, I was introduced to the joys of pickleball and gained plenty of porn-star followers.

Yet, I feel a little empty at the moment. More because of my lack of stories to tell than lack of interesting people to follow.

So I need stories. And to find stories I need to travel. So that's what I plan to do.

From 2010 to 2011, I'm going on a European odyssey. At the moment, I haven't organised well enough to say any more. But I think, from the attention @waxingmoonman's departure has received, I'll soon be tweincarnated (sorry, Mike, had to). It appears that people like reading my writing, and - as I'm sure 99% of writers will agree - that's sort of our target. So thank you, it's lovely to have such a loyal and sincere readership.

So please look out for me, in the summer, when I'll return for the beginning of my new voyage. And I'll tweet again. And blog again.

But until then, I must say goodbye to you all.

See you on the other side.

Thank you,
The Artist Formerly Known as The Tweeter @waxingmoonman

PS please come and read the blog if you'd like to hear how things are going - you can even become a follower if you look to your right...

Why I'm leaving Twitter

2010-03-22T10:50:00.000Z

Today, during the week of Twestivals in big cities all over the world, and Truro, I've decided to kill off @waxingmoonman, my Twitter alias. No, not kill off - silence. Forever.

I've been tweeting for almost a year. It all started because people wanted to know what I was getting up to on my odd-sounding moonwalks during 2009 - like walking through an artillery range on Salisbury Plain, around the Lost Gardens of Heligan at midnight, and around London ('City of the Moon') on New Year's Eve.

Although I still moonwalk once a month, I no longer share these on my blog (it just felt right that 'Moonwalking' should be a year-long adventure). And I rarely tweet these mini-adventures. This is one of a few reasons to close my Twitter account.

Let me explain.

I have nothing interesting to say

In 2009, I met drunk Highlanders who threatened to throw me to some mythical waterhorses, I nearly fell thirty feet to my death on Loughrigg Fell in the Lake District, I stumbled a little drunk around and around and around Urchfont while following in the steps of the Wiltshire Moonrakers. I had people to meet, stories to tell. Every month brought excitement. Every tweet contained news.

Yesterday, I told people I played tennis.

It didn't entertain or amuse or persuade. It probably just irritated a bit.

I'm a writer. I usually write about people. I write scripts, magazine articles, I try to write books, I write stories and poems. I write for businesses that are trying to connect with people. I need to be a sponge, not a... person who tells 280 other people that he's just hit a ball over a net (I played very badly, if you're interested, which you're not).

My messages bore me. Lord only knows what they do to my fine followers.

This morning, I walked along a river. Smelled the grass, heard the birds chatting, watched the sun shimmering on the water, felt the texture of a leaf. I can't do that on the internet. So it's time to step outside and let the world thunder on around me.

It'll make me a better writer.

Saying all this, I may return in a different guise for my next travel adventure. I plan to visit a town in the middle of Europe this summer to research. If successful, and if people would like to follow my adventure, I'll set up a new Twitter account and tell people stories.

About playing tennis in Bulgaria.

Until that day, @waxingmoonman is putting down his twen, folding up his twetchpad, saying a huge thank you to his twollowers for a twantastic year, and twining off.

To the twuture!

PS I'll still be blogging here when something interesting happens
PPS there are some interesting projects on the horizon...

Sometimes I design things too

2010-03-17T17:07:00.001Z

This morning, I built a tower from some business cards.

This afternoon, I photographed said business cards and created this triptych.

Said tower collapsed after said photography.

The cards say

Robert Self-Pierson

Writer

rsp@robertselfpierson.co.uk
www.robertselfpierson.co.uk
07754808899

in case you're looking for a copywriter who knows his colon from his elbow.

Please don't analyse my Google searches

2010-03-13T13:47:00.000Z

For the last three weeks, I've been writing and designing entries for the Chip Shop Awards. The Awards are a chance to lampoon ads from around the world that take themselves a little too seriously.

Or as Dave Trott, chairman of the judging panel, says:

"I think the purpose of The Chip Shop Awards is to take the piss."

So that's what I tried, working alongside Dan, the owner of the excellent branding agency D'mastermind.

The process of designing and writing these new ads led to some very strange Google searches indeed. The sorts of things that can get you locked up, or at least shunned and banished from decent society.

Things like

hitler smiling in a beetle

ugly old drunk man

fat woman naked in bed

hitler's favourite type of biscuit

and

susan boyle looking sexy

In a couple of months, Dan and I will either be the proud owners of a giant, plastic Chip. Or we'll be branding from behind bars.

Will let you know.

If the jail has wireless.

26 + International PEN + Tahar Djaout =

2010-03-01T11:10:00.001Z

I'm a member of the writers' organisation 26. It's a fantastic group of writers - brand writers, web writers, design writers, book writers, poets, script writers, journalists. You name an industry that needs words, I'll find you a member of 26.

Why 26? It's the number of letters in the alphabet. 'It was perfect,' said John Simmons, one of the founding members of the group, when I met him for a coffee before Christmas. 'There we were, a number of people who played with words every day - and we were using numerals to name ourselves.'

I joined because I wanted to get involved in writing projects that had nothing to do with money - exercises that would push me more than a copywriting career alone. More than a book-writing career. More than scriptwriting, poetry, short stories. There's nothing worse than reading your own words and thinking, God, I wonder who wrote that rubbish. And I find that happens to me quite a bit.

So 26 was an excuse to write for fun, and writing for fun is what writing should be all about.

Language is full of rules. Take grammar. Lots of things to do. Lots of things you shouldn't do. Then there's semantics. And spelling. And structure. And ra ra ra ra ra ra ra. Sometimes it's right to just let go. We get nowhere in life without breaking a few rules.

Take Tahar Djaout.

Tahar Djaout was a secular Algerian writer. He was extreme in nothing but words. Which is what killed him. Islamist extremists, terrorists, shot Tahar dead in 1993 because this man was writing out about repression, about the need for change in countries where an Islamist culture was spreading through schools.

Bullets sent him into a coma.

His final book, The Last Summer of Reason, focused on extremism, and how - if it was left unchallenged - the brains of the Eastern (and, often, Muslim) world would be destroyed, the writers silenced, the burning flames extinguished by a fanatical desire to indoctrinate people. Yes, people. Just ordinary people who wanted to live freely, in democracy.

Tahar was murdered before The Last Summer of Reason was published.

A couple of months ago, I signed up for my first 26 project. One writer from 26 would be paired with one writer from the last 50 years. This other writer would be chosen by International PEN. It would be somebody whom PEN supported - somebody silenced for their writing, jailed, or, like Tahar Djaout, murdered.

The challenge - respond to your writer in 50 words.

Nothing else. Interpret. Take the life of your writer, his or her work, his or her words and style and voice, or favourite colour or hairstyle or anything, and respond. In 50 words.

My entry was published here on Sunday.

But before I got to that stage, I wrote these. (I want to share everything I wrote because Tahar Djaout should be celebrated in as many ways as possible, not left silent.)

I want to offer you my voice because they stole yours.
Bang. May 1993 – your last spring of life.
Bang. They silenced you.

Then we found your final book,
Named it, published it, shared it,
bang.

Writer, poet,
A man who wrote about freedom
knowing he’d lose his own.

Yekker.

* * *

Obituary

Instead of resisting them, he embraced their passage through the air that he shared with the world. He followed these fledgling birds as they searched for warmth. He watched and pitied them as they landed. And that day, still standing for freedom, he took his enemy to his grave.

If you'd like to know more about the wonderful work of 26, have a read of their website. Same with International PEN.

If you'd like to know a little more about this project from John Simmons, John's written this.

And if you'd like to follow this project over the next 50 days, as 50 more writers from 26 are paired with 50 writers from around the world, there's a smashing blog here.

Billy's World - The Day Billy Became a Writer (through Google)

2010-02-25T15:14:00.000Z

I've noticed a lot of online debate recently about what writers and copywriters do to make a living. I haven't really got involved as it often looks like it might turn into a big, scary, nasty cyber argument, and I don't really like the look of those. I'd rather write about trees or something.

But then I got curious and wondered what Google might advise for somebody who might like to try writing.

So I put myself into the shoes of a person who doesn't write for a living but would like to become a writer. This person doesn't have time (or enough interest) to learn the craft, so he's Googling it.

Welcome to Billy's first forays into the mysterious world of 'writing'.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Right, I want to be a writer, thinks Billy. But where to start? I know, I'll do some research on Google. It helped last week when I wanted to buy a new book, so it'll probably help me with this thing too.

Billy starts his research. I guess before anything else I need to know what a writer is, thinks Billy, turning on his computer. He begins to type into Google.

Wow, that was easy, thinks Billy, not even clicking on any of the 34.5 million results explaining that a writer is somebody who writes.

So a writer is somebody who writes, thinks Billy. That sounds good. But can I do it?

And is there anyone else out there who wants to know if they can write a... something, just like me?

Right, so anyone can write anything. That's good, sighs a relieved Billy, whose dreams were nearly shattered. This is easy. Writers must be a happy bunch.

Oh, well that's a surprise. Maybe they don't get paid much. Or maybe they don't have much sex. I wonder if Google can shine any light on these fears of mine, thinks Billy, feeling more writerly by the minute.

Hmm, this is rather easy, thinks Billy, clicking on the 203 million results that tell him how much he could earn by writing. But how do writers do what they do?

Simple. Like that, thinks Billy.

He puts his feet up for a bit and thinks about what sort of writer he wants to be. Do I write a book or a screenplay? Hmm, well I know a screenplay will pay me more money so maybe I'll do that. Oh wait, he thinks, what about being a copywriter?

He heard about that recently.

Woah, things have got complicated. Billy wants to be a writer, not confused. I didn't realise you could spell copywriter in so many ways, he thinks.

And now he doesn't even know what one is. I just thought they wrote terms and conditions or something.

Why are writers so complicated? he wants to ask Google. So he begins-

Crazy? Eek, thinks Billy. Can I really be bothered with this?

Well, I've got nothing better to do, he thinks.

Hmm, but where to start?

Ahh, that's better. I'll start by doing some good grammar.

Please note that these are all real auto-complete search results on Google. Honest. I just thought they were quite funny.

I've been reading John Simmons's 26 ways of looking at a blackberry and it reminded me just how fun playing with words can be. Here's how a novel one day I might try to write might start.

2010-02-22T11:34:00.000Z

He lifts the mug to his mouth.

But he doesn't drink. Too much going on outside, on the street, with the pigeon gazing over the cigarette butt, through the glaze of the window. At him.

Too many bodies passing and glancing in.

Any one of them could be him.

And then what would he do? If he was confronted? Again? If he'd found out exactly what happened last night with his dead wife?

The shotgun by the bed. 'For shooting pigeons,' she said.

So your husband kills birds? OK. At the time his passion told him he believed what she'd just lied to him. At the time, with his trousers tangled around his trainers, he would've believed anything she'd said.

Now, just hours after doing it, with coffee rippling in the cheap cafe mug and hot steam blinking his eyes which keep darting to the pigeon that still pecks at the butt, he wishes he'd just said No. No at the club. No in the cab. No in her bedroom.

And No to the man when he told him to point the gun at his wife's face and pull the trigger.

Last night he manslaughtered a woman and stole a £500,000 watch.

Now he knows the dead wife's husband knows about the watch and wants his time back.

But all he can do is think about the woman. The woman he'd been following for three years.

The night I fell asleep

2010-02-20T12:50:00.001Z

Last night, I fell asleep on the last train home from London.

It meant I flew past my station. Which meant I needed to find another way home. Which meant I had to stop a strange man in the street and ask him where I could find a cab. Which meant hanging around at a petrol station with three aggressive youths on a frosty evening in a town I didn't know.

That ten-minute nap was the best I've had in a long time. Here's why.

As the strange man in the suit led me from Rye House station to Hoddesdon town centre, he told me a story. A couple of years ago, while working in Egypt, he was kidnapped by a cab driver. Instead of driving my new friend to the pyramids, the driver chugged him away from the populated areas of Cairo. Away from the hubbub of markets. Away from safety.

He was in Egypt as a programmer, checking up on the work he'd outsourced. 'Much cheaper to get them to do it,' he told me, as we navigated the frozen puddles in the backside of a town I'd heard of but never before visited. 'I was in Egypt with my friend, so we felt all right, even though we didn't have a clue where we were.'

Eventually, the Egyptian cab driver pulled up in the middle of nowhere and asked for money. 'He was mugging you?' I asked. 'No, he said he now wanted to take us to the museum. Thing is, there is no museum.' Another puddle.

'So I said to him, I said, "Look, either I'm gonna die or you're gonna die, so let's work this out."'

My programming friend and his colleague jumped from the cab on some dusty track - without seeing the pyramids, without seeing the museum - and ran, before hailing another cab.

At the petrol station in Hoddesdon, my storytelling friend left me. So I hailed a cab.

'Yeah, I'm working. Just need to pop home quickly,' said the cab driver who'd just pulled up to refuel.

So I stood outside a BP garage with stories of muggings and museums in my head, waiting for my cab driver friend to return. Three youths turned up and began threatening the Asian man in the petrol station, who refused to sell the boys cigarettes.

'You're a f***ing disgrace, mate. **** you and your mate.'

Strangely, that didn't encourage the Asian man to serve the boys their cigarettes. They turned and stared at me, standing there in my flat cap, with my laptop case hanging from my shivering shoulder.

Ten minutes later, my cab driver returned, just as the smokeless youths worked out that there might be a laptop in that man's laptop case.

'I need to get to the pyramids,' I joked, before quickly realising this wouldn't mean anything to him. I hopped in before I was mugged.

During the twenty-minute drive back home, my friendly cabbie told me a story.

'I had this chap phone me once at about 5am. "Hi," he was whispering, "I need to get home." So I asked where he was. He told me he'd find out.

'After a few minutes of hearing him rifling through letters to find an address, he whispered a post code. He'd clearly had a night out, ended up at someone's house and now needed to get home before his wife noticed.'

I got home last night. I left the cab with a big smile on my face.

And then I slept properly, not on a train, not in a cab, not in Egypt, not in someone else's house. But at home, with all the excitement now outside my window.

Imagine if...

2010-02-18T13:50:00.002Z

..this very good, very clear sign from the Environment Agency...

...became this, written by a company trying to hide the facts...

No writing should sound like this.

A lot of writing sounds exactly like this. Still. Usually in businesses, who forget that they're actually talking to other fleshy human beings.

Some great organisations like 26 are trying to get rid of this sort of language. And I'm trying to help in my little freelance way.

This writing is confusing. It wastes time.

And one day it could kill a fisherman.

Biz-speak? Nah, it's poetry.

2010-02-12T11:28:00.000Z

Last night, I visited Elmwood in Soho for the SoPo poetry evening, devised and brilliantly introduced by Laura Forman, the writer at Elmwood.

Elmwood is a leading brand consultancy, working with huge, international clients. But I wasn't there for business writing. Nope, last night was poetry, and what a lovely change it made. The best thing about the evening was that it had nothing to do with writing for business. Therefore it sparked a lot of thoughts about writing for business.

The problem with business writing, as far as I can see, is that a lot of businesses feel it should be businessy. So they use words like 'deliverables', and everything is 'targeted', and 'solutions' need to be 'workable'.

Outside of the business world, nobody uses these words.

Does the MD of a huge supermarket chain go to the pub and say he wants a targeted and workable solution to his thirst problem? No. He asks for a pint.

The third poet to speak last night was Hugo Williams. Hugo stood looking half scruffy, half smart, his jacket hanging on the shoulder of the chair beside him. He had slanting grey hair and a half-winking eye. And, I'll be honest, I feared that his words were going to shoot high over my head, into that abstract world that baffles so many people. And puts so many people off poetry. And off words.

Hugo was exceptional. He told simple stories through poetry - about his mother, his school days, his daydreams, his religion (or, often, lack of). Everybody listened and smiled, even chuckled occasionally, breaking that poetry-evening quiet that perhaps we expect from such a coming together.

Between poems he met our eyes and told stories that built anticipation for the next minute, where he'd need to read from his page. The stories were as entertaining and thought-provoking as the poems.

I'm not a poet but I loved Hugo's writing. Why? Because he wrote it and spoke it at a level that connected with everybody reading and hearing. It was honest and true. It revealed something about the man. And I wanted to know more. So this morning I've been reading about his life and I'm about to order one of his poetry collections. I'm not a poet. I loved Hugo's writing.

Words are scarily powerful things. They can entertain, persuade, encourage, connect completely different people. They can bruise and hurt and scare. They can take us back to a time in our lives that we'd otherwise forget. They can baffle, they can enlighten.

Or, they can do nothing.

don't look up.

2010-02-03T22:34:00.000Z

a poem from a Tube train on the Central Line in London

What am I?
A rolling, tolling, drooling, mule thing
A growling, howling, prowling, mal thing
A tube in a tunnel
A siphon
A funnel
A tin, a box
I'm a thing
A fox?
Juddering underground, scampering above
I'm nothing to you but a seat and a stand
No glory, no colour
No sea, no sand And
I'm sleeping in daytime, I'm sleeping at night
I sleep when I'm woken
I sleep when the sight
of those 23 passengers push at my doors
and slump on my pillows
and claw
at my handles
With sweat and dirt and no sort of care
And no sort of loving
And nothing but haste
Because they taste money and
money tastes good
to the man with his suit and the lady in black
who when they fall from my body
They never look back
Who am I?

That's the idea. Just need to find it.

2010-02-02T21:41:00.000Z

I'm working with a creative agency this week. They're one of the leading creative agencies in town. Not just any town, a big town. London. It's a huge privilege.

I can't say too much. Which is a shame. But them be the rules.

But I can say that I'm working on an exciting project. It's more than words. It's more than design or branding or web or any of those agency terms those of us who work in the marketing industry use every day to explain what 'creatives' do. It's ideas. And that's why it's so exciting.

Business writing exciting? Yes.

Today I spent hours trying to think up an idea to say something important in a way that would stand out. Not just stand out - stand out for the right reason. What is the right reason? To spread the message: the important message. I wrote lots. Drew lots. But nothing that stood out.

Then it happened.

I looked at a poster on the wall, above the head of another writer. I stared for a few minutes until my mind emptied. Then my eyes saw something, and that something put a word in my head. That word just happened to be the word I needed to connect to another thought, then another word.

Before long, these words became a sentence. I looked at the poster again. And the idea formed. It seemed so obvious now and the words began to flow and the idea developed and my breathing increased and my mind started to tell me that this idea had a destination. This idea wasn't just a random thought, but the beginning of a concept, an approach. Soon I was staring at a page of scribbles. Healthy, lively scribbles.

And how did it start?

By taking the time to stare and empty my mind of thoughts so that new, creative thoughts could pour in. I'm not saying that's how to be creative but it's good to always be aware of the world around you, because ideas can come from anywhere.

The story unfolds

2010-01-24T20:12:00.000Z

In the last post I promised to explain why that post was a story - what turned that collection of words, sentences and paragraphs into a structured piece of writing. There's a little more to it than beginning, middle and end. But not much.

Here it is: the story behind the story.

...

What's your word of 2010? [the 'inciting incident' (Aristotle) which kickstarts the story - the reader will expect a full answer to this and, more importantly, an explanation]

My answer?

Story. [here's the simple answer, which sets up the rest of the story, provoking the question Why?]

Why 'story'? Because without a story, words are just words. In whatever persuasive writing you write, a story is the difference between interesting a reader and making them feel a bit bored. It's easy to bore readers - we can all do it. But as a copywriter, boredom is my enemy. The moment a reader loses interest, they stop reading and they stop thinking. [first paragraph - offers a simple answer to the posed question but suggests there's more to this answer]

Have you ever started a book with energy, only to find yourself ten minutes later just scanning the words and thinking about what to have for dinner? It's so easy to do. In fact, you're probably now thinking about what to have for dinner. [second paragraph - involves the reader, asks questions, tries to get the reader on side, sympathises to keep the reader reading; builds momentum]

I have the answer. [the big reveal...]

Lasagne. [the misdirection, twist]

No, I mean to avoid boring a reader. Tell a good story (even books forget to do this sometimes). Stories work for narrative non-fiction. Stories work for novels. Stories work for poetry, for text messages, for brand identity. We encounter stories every day of our lives. When you're next in the pub, somebody will tell you a story. When you're at your desk in your office, somebody will share a tale. When you're on the train, plots and narratives will dance in the air and float into your ears. [the climax, the actual reveal, including a build-up and climax; and the 'cause']

Some you'll remember, some you'll forget. Some are just words, collections of thoughts - some are cracking stories. [the resolution and conclusion - the new world (containing the new knowledge learned by the reader) - is proposed; alongside the 'effect']

Do you have a word for 2010? If so, try turning it into a story. That way you'll never forget it. [the afterthought]

...

OK, so this is a very basic structure. But there's a beginning, middle, end; there's something to start the piece, there's development, and there's a resolution. It's probably not going to win the Booker Prize, but it shows how even the simplest, shortest piece of prose can contain storytelling techniques that date back millenia.

Without thinking about it, we all tell stories everyday. We all apply these structures in conversation. But when it comes to writing, it's important to remember the structure, remember the devices, and then play with it all until that piece of writing does as you intend. And please remember: break as many of these rules as the piece requires.

Tell me a good story

2010-01-19T22:48:00.000Z

The writers organisation 26 produces a monthly newsletter. Each contains the thoughts of members. I'm a member, so this month I provided my thoughts.

What's your word of 2010?

My answer?

Story.

Why 'story'? Because without a story, words are just words. In whatever persuasive writing you write, a story is the difference between interesting a reader and making them feel a bit bored. It's easy to bore readers - we can all do it. But as a copywriter, boredom is my enemy. The moment a reader loses interest, they stop reading and they stop thinking.

Have you ever started a book with energy, only to find yourself ten minutes later just scanning the words and thinking about what to have for dinner? It's so easy to do. In fact, you're probably now thinking about what to have for dinner.

I have the answer.

Lasagne.

No, I mean to avoid boring a reader. Tell a good story (even books forget to do this sometimes). Stories work for narrative non-fiction. Stories work for novels. Stories work for poetry, for text messages, for brand identity. We encounter stories every day of our lives. When you're next in the pub, somebody will tell you a story. When you're at your desk in your office, somebody will share a tale. When you're on the train, plots and narratives will dance in the air and float into your ears.

Some you'll remember, some you'll forget. Some are just words, collections of thoughts - some are cracking stories.

Do you have a word for 2010? If so, try turning it into a story. That way you'll never forget it.

PS this was a story - in the next post, I'll explain how this post is more than just a collection of words

Serving the vibe... with a world of new words

2010-01-13T17:38:00.000Z

I admit, I knew very little about dance music. I knew even less about online dance music. So when it came to serving the vibe, I realised I had some research to do.

www.servethevibe.com

Before Christmas, a couple of technology experts with a love of dance music approached me. They'd created a new concept. They'd started a new company. Now, they told me, they needed to bring everything together through branding. And - because they're smart people - they realised the importance of getting the words and tone of voice right before everything else.

I worked with the TrackStack team over a few weeks. We looked at the existing company copy and discussed how a new tone of voice - more energy, more written enthusiasm - could help attract visitors to the site. And sell the idea to those investors who are so important to the long-term success of the business.

The team has launched the pre-launch site for TrackStack - the one that gets us excited.

I love the whole idea: the concept, the product, the people. The team's hardworking, full of creativity, simmering with ideas, and eager to change the online dance music world. They want to make that world a fairer place.

I think TrackStack is heading for big things.

2010. A big year. With two 0s. And three targets.

2010-01-10T22:44:00.000Z

People asked me recently if I had any New Year resolutions. In fact, they asked me at New Year, which sort of makes sense. And I said No. My answer was due partly to my tiredness: I’d been walking around London for nearly 12 hours. But it was also because 2009 had surpassed my expectations hugely. And any 2010 plans would, I feared, wipe it from the map of my mind. The map I’d followed around Britain for a year. The map that’d led me along many a wrong route but also brought me unseen joys along the way.

But it’s now January 11th – yep, the perfect day for January resolutions. Because, you see, I’ve realised there’s only one way to prolong a good memory. And that’s to add to it.

So that’s 2010 sorted. It’s 2009+new stuff.

And this blog is going to be the home of that year.

rob-writes (this blog) has lived many lives. And it’s died a couple of deaths. It began as a university project with no readers. Then it gained a reader. Then I stopped writing because I had nothing to write about. Then I moonwalked around Great Britain and neglected this blog.

And then I made a big decision.

In September 2009 I gave up work to write Moonwalking as a book. Alongside writing the book, I decided I might need to eat. So I bought a cereal bar. But I needed more. More cereal bars. Breakfast, lunch, dinner, sometimes an evening snack. So I called myself a freelance copywriter. And I resurrected rob-writes as my copywriting blog.

Guess what. Things are changing again.

I write for business. I’ve written for magazines. I write websites. Last week, I joined forces with a brand mastermind and soon I’ll be offering creative direction on branding projects. I’m writing a book. I’ve written scripts.

I am what they call in the trade a freak. No, not a freak. A writer, that’s it.

I’m not really a copywriter. Or a travel writer. Or a journalist. Mainly because I wouldn’t be able to afford my evening snacks with any of these areas alone. I’m just a writer. Someone who, when asked, picks lots of words and puts them together into sentences with varying degrees of success. Some like, some don’t. But these words seem to entertain enough people to keep doing it.

So yes, rob-writes, this blog, is going to become home to my writing. But it won’t be aimless, no no no, like some sort of online diary… a – I don’t know – web-log or something. Nope. Because I have aims. Resolutions. Targets. And here are a few to judge me on at the end of the year.

1. In 2009 I found an agent; in 2010, I’d like a publisher
2. In 2009 I travelled Britain by full moon; in 2010, I’ll reveal my next travel adventure, start its blog, and hopefully entertain some people again with my foolish attempts at travelling
3. And in 2010 I plan to move back to Cornwall, where my heart lies

Please follow this blog if you’d like to see how I get on. I’m sure I’ll fail a lot – but some things will, I hope, go my way. In fact, I’ll make sure they do or this blog will just be a bit rubbish.

My first target is to send a book proposal to my agent on Friday. And see what happens after that. Who knows, I could have a publisher begging me to write Moonwalking by next week.

Equally, I could be out of cereal bars.

Art & Copy, a film by Doug Pray – a review

2009-11-29T13:03:00.001Z

Creativity Can Solve Anything…

It excited me so much I marched along Tottenham Court Road breathing deeper than usual. The man with the Apple bag didn’t know why. Neither did the girl in the Hilfiger boots. I had to get to the station. To sit, to recount, to write it all down. To put copy to the art in my head.

At the station, two girls chatted. “It must’ve been a bad film: I can’t remember anything about it.” It sounded like Hollywood hadn’t matched what I’d just seen. I sat in the station. My train approached. It stopped. Faces fell out. It pulled away. Instead of telling me to board the train, my mind repeated the words of George, Lee, Hal, Phyllis, Mary. And I wrote.

What a night.

On Friday, I attended the UK premiere of Art & Copy (a film by Doug Pray) with Dan, the owner of branding and advertising agency Dmastermind. After a brief introduction from The One Club (“to support the next generation of advertising professionals”), we reclined in the luxury seats of the Charlotte Street Hotel cinema, flipped out the in-built tables, and waited for the treats to begin.

Chad hit our screens. A poster boy. Sort of. Not the start we expected.

People like Chad are the final link in the advertising chain, before consumers judge the power of advertisers’ creativity with their habits, their voices, their movements and most importantly – to businesses at least – their money. Chad is one of many whose job it is to paste adverts to billboards. And with billboard rotation employing three generations of Chads, the man pastes with care. But Chad is just one small part of a process that begins years before.

Art & Copy is a collation of wise words from advertising greats of the last 50 years. The first man to strike us is George Lois. Here’s a man, a self-proclaimed Greek streetfighter, who grew up in the Bronx in New York. George brought the world “I want my MTV” and put Tommy Hilfiger on the same page as Ralph Lauren and Calvin Klein. “That ad turbo-charged my success,” says Hilfiger, years later, now recovered from the embarrassment of appearing on the same bill as his idols.

The ad is simple. It’s art and copy. It’s “Hangman” with the Tommy Hilfiger logo as the only clue. “It’s seemingly outrageous,” explains Lois. It’s not actually outrageous, once you’ve looked at it for a few seconds. “It’s on the nose.”

Lee Clow (TBWAChiatDay), the man behind Apple’s biggest ads, is a surfer, family man, ideas man. Clow painted a ship as a child. The smoke floated in the right direction. From then, he knew he wanted to be an artist. “My art was going to be my way of making a living.” Clow developed into one of the most powerful advertisers (“media artists”) in the world. But that doesn’t mean he always gets his own way. “We can’t allow clients to dictate mediocre work.” Bad advertising – thoughtless, artless, benign – is, to Clow, “an insidious cancer”.

“They can’t do shit if we don’t do ads for them. We should be in charge.”

Hal Riney, a man who brought heart into advertising, explains how creativity in business has transformed since the 1960s. “Creativity wasn’t really anything. Creatives were just flunkies in the agencies. I wanted to be an account guy in a suit.” So he became one. And hated it. Soon a spark turned him into a leading creative thinker for brands like Perrier. Riney was the man who asked Paul Williams from The Carpenters to write a song for the Crocker Bank, to bring some young blood to the brand. “We’ve Only Just Begun” was born. And lives on.

An hour and a half of Art & Copy passed in a blink. The cast of artists, writers, thinkers and doers entertained throughout. And, of course, the film is expertly and beautifully edited together.

The film leaves the viewer with a clear message, which is reiterated by George, Lee, Hal, Phyllis, Mary and more. It’s the message that crosses the floors of Wieden+Kennedy, TBWAChiatDay, DDB, Goodby, Silverstein and Partners. The message that should be driven deep into businesses and agencies that consider “How big do you want the logo?” a creative question.

And it’s this. Storytelling and artistry should be at the heart of branding – they raise consumer expectation, which raises standards. Which can only be a good thing. “If the product’s no good and I’ve said it is, then I’m out of a job,” explains Lois.

Take risks. Do what people don’t expect. Push boundaries.

In the words of the Bronx streetfighter who turned MTV and Tommy Hilfiger into overnight successes: “Everything should be so ambitious.”

If you like art and copy, see this film.

A little update...

2009-11-26T10:43:00.001Z

It's been a month since my last post. Time waits for no man - it certainly isn't waiting for me. So what can happen in a month? This...

Delavi.org launched

I worked with Dmastermind to brand this fantastic Nigerian fashion designer. Dmastermind gave her the look, I offered the words. The site's received some glowing feedback. The most recent: "Wow - that's eye-catching. Striking. Powerful." Well done to Dan at Dmastermind for his top designs, as always.

The start-up

Sadly I can't say much about this but I can say it's very exciting. A unique online music service will soon be launched and I've had the privilege of helping to brand it. From the very early stages. So that's tone of voice, brand language, pitches, and more. Can't wait to help take this super company towards big things. I'm pretty sure once the final investment is organised, this little beauty will fly.

The magazine

This month sees my first feature article published in Cornwall Today (voted the UK's best regional magazine). Moonwalking - my big project of 2009 - is drawing to a close. And starting to gain some big interest. The project's blog is rocketing towards 5,000 readers and my Twitter following increases by the day. Rather exciting. If the project finds a publisher, it'd be a wonderful bonus.

Pitches

I've been asked to write for three rebranding pitches (with some top London agencies). One for a national company, one for an international company, and one for an internet-based thingy. Can't say more. Yet.

Meetings

Over the last few weeks, I've met with managing directors, creative directors, heads of copy, travel writers, poets, designers, entrepreneurs, agents. And it's all been great fun, eye-opening and inspiring. Hoping it all continues and the projects carry on enthusing and challenging my thinking and writing.

My next target - work on some Christmas branding. Anyone like some Christmas wishes with a difference?

Words Seeking Designs

2009-11-04T15:11:00.001Z

A little something I designed and wrote last week. It's actually shameless marketing but you'll never know that as the design wins you over... Please do get in touch if you'd like to see a portfolio of my copywriting (and creative direction). Brand stories, tone of voice, straplines, web copy and SEO; you name it, I've probably written it.

Where credit's due

2009-10-18T20:54:00.000+01:00

A couple of weeks ago I saw this advert on the Underground.

The Times

The average Londoner wakes up at 6:04am, 44 minutes earlier than the rest of the UK.

Only one newspaper guarantees Londoners free home delivery before 7am every day.

Sign up at timesonline.co.uk/7am

Be part of the times.

And I thought, what an excellent piece of writing.

I don't want to strip it down and analyse exactly, technically, why I like it. It doesn't require that for it to have power. Suffice to say, it's short, it's simple, it uses statistics that - even though they may not be 100% accurate - sound about right, it's perfect for its audience (tone of voice, confidence without boastfulness, position), and it tells a quick story: how this paper does something that no other paper can offer.

Copywriting should be about these things.

I know writers don't often do this, but here's my version of the same text, written badly (for a fictional newspaper). Breaking the rules above.

The Way - one of the best newspapers around.

The Way is a leading UK newspaper, read across London by busy commuters. Our modern, unique service promises reliable delivery across much of London on a daily basis, offering the best solution. The Way can guarantee an efficient and reliable delivery service. Newspapers will arrive before 7am.

Please visit www.thewaynewspapergroup.co.uk

Freelance portfolio and website

2009-10-10T12:47:00.001+01:00

Last week I started putting together my portfolio - not easy when the majority of my work is from full-time employment inside an agency. But I've managed to combine a few bits and bobs, websites and brochures, articles and straplines and other wordy things.

In fact, it's been a branding sort of month. After losing my website to a hosting company without customer services or telephones, I built a new one (a new website, silly, not hosting company). We're not talking award-winning, but it's certainly worth a little plug here.

www.robertselfpierson.co.uk

If you'd like to see my portfolio, please drop me an email (via my website), DM me on Twitter or pick up the phone and give me call in the good old-fashioned way.

Twitter-talk

2009-10-07T11:08:00.000+01:00

A couple of months ago I moaned about BT on Twitter. Within a couple of hours they'd sent me a message asking if they could help. Then I had a little moan about Starbucks. And who should send me a message? Yep, you've got it, Mr Starbucks.

So from being a nice little communication tool between friends, or simple status update gizmo, Twitter is becoming a brilliant marketing tool for business. That's what they did, BT and Starbucks, they marketed their customer services through social networking.

I recently wrote an article for a web development agency about the benefits of social networking. Now that blogging, tweeting, Facebook, LinkedIn and Tumblr dominate the web, it's important that all businesses embrace the online shift. Companies can't afford to be faceless these days. The less they say, the more damaging it is.

And what does it all return to? Words.

The right words on the right platform can make a huge difference. Twitter proves this. In just 140 characters, BT needed to apologise and offer help. A couple of years a phonecall was needed - or a letter, an email. Today, you have about twenty words. So you need to make them good ones.

26 Exchanges. More Than Words.

2009-09-23T12:37:00.002+01:00

Beautiful. Powerful. Moving. Emotional. Inspiring.

It's just words.

I find it amazing how different minds process the same thing. The same sight, sound, colour, movement. When an old boss briefed a design colleague on edits he needed to make to a door-drop flyer – a simple, two-sided card flyer – she used the words, "Don’t worry – it's just words". Her translation of her client’s feedback was to just change the words.

If she'd visited 26's London Design Festival exhibition at the Royal Academy of Engineering this week, perhaps she would have noticed something.

Sometimes words mean more than words.

Two walls. Two projectors. Many smiling, absorbed faces. Hundreds of hours of writers, designers and printers; of sound engineers, event organisers. Of readers. All coming together to produce something beautiful, powerful, moving, emotional and inspiring. These are the words I overheard.

In just a few months, 11 writers from 26 worked with 11 writers from International PEN to explore, as John Simmons notes, "the difficulties, triumphs and surprises of attempting 'translation' between languages and cultures". The task – take 11 texts from 11 different languages, from Spanish to the African language Shona, via Europe, South America and Asia, and translate the words, the meanings.

Writers wrote and spoke, communicated their thoughts across continents, and created a special exhibition. Harry Pearce, design partner at Pentagram, then interpreted the stories graphically – creating this little room bursting with world literature.

"This is a list of all the people to thank," said John, unrolling the paper in his hand, near the end of Tuesday's reception. "So many contributed to this wonderful exhibition. I'm very proud."

Hearing the list of people and skills involved, I marvelled at the power of words to bring people together. From an idea to a blog to an exhibition to a book. 26 Exchanges demonstrates how words and stories can translate into so much more when they undertake a journey.

"Translation is the process of making a bridge that two writers can walk across from different sides," writes John. What happens in the middle, as this exhibition shows beautifully, is always something exciting.

Important.
The exhibition runs until this Friday 5.00pm. And it's FREE. Visit today. Or tomorrow. Or Friday.

Website under construction

2009-09-22T13:12:00.002+01:00

Apologies to anyone visiting the website and finding nothing. I am completely to blame. This is what happens when a writer tries to get technical. A website disappears.

Normal service will resume shortly. I hope.

Tortoise for sale - avoiding the hard shell

2009-09-18T13:44:00.000+01:00

I'm lucky to be writing a book while working as a writer for business.

I'd never have thought the moon and a chain of pubs could sit so closely in part of my mind - the Lake District and road resurfacing, Roman legionaries and telecommunications, Galileo and remuneration. But they do. In a quirky sort of way.

Businesses, when left to themselves, often write about their business like we understand what they mean. If it's a pet shop then this is fine because we do understand what they mean. There's only one meaning of 'Tortoise for sale'. But when a telecoms company is trying to sell you ASDL or VOIP, it's not enough to say 'VOIP for sale'.

This is where external influences to writing are key.

Don't tell me what VOIP is in great detail*; tell me what it will do for me**. Tell me the story of where I am now, where VOIP will take me, and what I'll get from VOIP. Then, if I want to know what it means, I'll ask.

When asked to reproduce the copy for a waste recycling flow chart, I suggested turning the spoil's story (its adventure) into a comic strip. Cut down the information, stick in a couple of BLAMs and KABOOMs and tell the council in everyday language (you mean you don't say 'Kaboom' every day?) how spoil recycling works. Perhaps use poetry. Or a plot twist.

Perhaps use a narrative.

So when writing my book, I'm conscious of hooks - how to keep a reader reading. This I'm learning through copywriting ie how to entertain a reader, shopper, customer, buyer. When I'm writing copy for companies, I'm conscious of story, narrative.

Good writing takes a reader on a journey. The best writing produces the desired outcome.

*Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is a general term for a family of transmission technologies for delivery of voice communications over IP networks such as the Internet or other packet-switched networks. - wikipedia

**Make cheap calls over your computer. - me

Readers get hungry too.

2009-09-14T15:43:00.002+01:00

Since studying A-level Business Studies, I've avoided reading marketing books. They're usually thick, confusing, full of very long words that look nice but are unpronounceable and an offence to the language, and they lack substance. But, sadly, they're the foundation of the business world.

Today, I met John Simmons: a man I'd heard a lot about. John entertained me with a story of a young lad who in the 60s graduated with a degree in English from Oxford University and high hopes for the future. 'Can you drive?' asked careers advice. 'How about a taxi driver?'

The taxi world's loss is the writing world's gain. John became an advocate for clear communication in business - using writing as the means of that communication. Sounds simple. It's not.

Many businesses fear simple language. And what is the simplest form of language? It's me telling you a story. Like I have been. So if you're still reading, the story is interesting you. If you're a managing director, I may be winning you over. Though chances are you'll now click away because I'm talking to you - first person, present tense. Like you'd speak to your friends.

In John Simmons's Twenty-six ways of looking at a blackberry, he writes,

Business writing easily adopts an impersonal tone. It's the default tone that seems to offer security to the business executive. Perhaps it gives the writer the necessary get-out clause: 'It wasn't me writing that, it was the corporation. Don't blame me.'

Copywriting relies on entertaining somebody.

I don't mean you have to make someone laugh. But the writing needs to keep the reader interested. In our something-for-nothing culture, where many of us want to invest very little but reap a lot, readers need feeding. Reading becomes an investment. An investment of time. Valuable time. It's a writer's job to produce.

John's writing - as well as the emerging creative writing of many copywriters let loose on businesses - works. It works because it speaks to us but keeps us involved. We know the words - they're short and meaningful. We like the style - concise, punchy. And we can pronounce whole sentences that these writers write; so we don't feel stupid. It's time well spent.

The best writing attracts readers. And of course readers become customers if they want what you're selling.

From IBM's Annual Report 2000:

You're one page away from the no-holds-barred story of one year in the life of a company.
It's the story of big battles, stinging defeats and gritty comebacks. Unexpected alliances, daring forays and game-changing discoveries.
In many ways it's a story about the future, as well as the recent past, and about all business today. Which means it's about e-business, and one in particular. IBM.

Checking my briefs

2009-09-08T20:34:00.000+01:00

Today I received a brief for a very interesting international project. The brief was thorough, detailed, full of advice, bursting with the right sort of client information, and it contained the key message,

I won't make this too prescriptive as you are the expert.

This brief informed the agency and informed me about what the client wants. And, more importantly, it highlighted that the client understood their lack of expertise in marketing and branding. Hence employing a brand agency.

Briefs are key. They're an opportunity for a client to communicate their exact needs to a creative team. Without a brief, writers and designers may well produce incredible, beautiful words and designs. But they won't be what the client wants. That doesn't happen.

Ideas are sparked. They need a catalyst - and for business writing the catalyst should be a brief. Written, verbal - we shouldn't be fussy. But instruction in the sense of "We're looking for a brochure that makes our bulb factory look sexy" or "We want a website that makes people respect our circus" helps us - the people doing the work - produce the right sort of the thing for the right client.

Briefs that don't work so well are: "Can you just throw a few words together to make it better?" and "We want to be different - please".

With a good brief, the writer has no excuse for getting it completely wrong. Even with a first draft. Though of course if you read a brief wrong, that can still happen. Though I'd never do that. Never. I don't... I mean I...

We all make mistakes.

But it's not like it was a multinational car compa-

We all learn from mistakes.