Another interesting piece from The Conversation, by Jess Cotton, Lecturer at the School of English, Communication and Philosophy, Cardiff University.

Illness, unlike war, as English academic and writer Elizabeth Outka brilliantly demonstrates in her book Viral Modernism(2019), is a story that easily slips out of cultural and historical memory.

In illness, the modernist writer Virginia Woolf observed, “We cease to be soldiers in the army of the upright; we become deserters.” Woolf, writing i...

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In these troubled times, I thought these books, suggested by Pam Lock, a Lecturer in English Literature (Specialist in Victorian Literature and Alcohol) from the University of Bristol, in the Conversation, might be of interest.

The evolution of the novel and short story in the 19th century brought us one of the greatest human sources of comfort, besides food and a nice hot bath. When someone tells me they are planning to “curl up with a good book”, I am filled with a sense of peace on thei...

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It’s been great being involved with the new International Dylan Day. 14 May each year has been designated Dylan Day to mark the first time his play for voices ‘Under Milk Wood’ was performed in public in the USA. It’s a direct lift from Blooms Day, an annual event inspired by one of the lead characters in Ulysses, by James Joyce. We're going to celebrate it this year with an extra tour and extra Dylan content.  Book now for 13th May - the Saturday before the day.  We also have some id...

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We were all a bit surprised when Bob Dylan was awarded his Nobel prize for literature.  Our Charles Dickens Christmas Crawl stops at the very pub where Bob Dylan gave his first ever public performance outside the USA!  This is what Richard Brown, Reader in Modern Literature at the University of Leeds thought about it.

To the surprise of many, Bob Dylan has become the first singer-songwriter to win the Nobel prize in literature.

As the news broke, I was in the middle of teaching James Joyce to s...

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Having just celebrated the second Dylan Thomas day, we came across this on Facebook.  Written by Josh Brown, it's self-explanatory.  Nick Hennegan, our writer, really liked it and Josh gave us permission to repost it, so here it is.  Thanks Josh!

 

 
Brown's Hotel, Laugharne, Wales.

 

I have meant to post about my visit to Laugharne in the 70's since joining the [Dylan Thomas Facebook] group. Here it is........

 

I was born in a snowstorm in 1947, 6 years before Dylan died. My mo...

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I found this on the site of our friends at brainpickings.org.  I've written a random diary for years and sometimes felt it was a waste of time.  I also love "writing instruments" and paper and thought I was a bit weird!  Maria Popova and JS puts that right...

John Steinbeck on Writing, the Crucible of Creativity, and the Mobilizing Power of the Impossible
“A good writer always works at the impossible.”
BY MARIA POPOVA



An advocate for the creative benefits of keeping a diary, Virginia Woolf sa...
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I found this on the Quora Website.  I think Point 7 is particularly true... and it's taken me a long time to realise it!

Lev Grossman, Author of the bestselling Magicians trilogy and journalist at Time magazine

1. Get your stuff in on time.

2. Don’t write anything that you wouldn’t say out loud – don’t say “perhaps,” say “maybe.” Don’t say “yet” when you mean “but.” And so on.

3. Read read read, all you can, all the time. Don’t worry about other people influencing ...
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It's the New Year and you should come and visit us in London as soon as you can. Outside of town, check out some of the Literary Festivals we host in the UK.

There are now literary festivals throughout the year in most areas of the country. The largest ones include:

The Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival, at the end of March
The Hay Festival, in late May
Edinburgh International Book Festival, in August (Hear Nick Hennegan at the 2015 Festival on our podcast page)
Cheltenham Festival of Literatu...
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With our writer, Nick Hennegan, taking 2 weeks in Wales to write, we thought this article from The Conversation by Andrew Tate, Reader in English at Lancaster University, might be appropriate.

Hell is not, as Sartre suggested, other people – it’s a holiday without books. Holidays, with their promise of carefree pleasure seeking, might seem like the most materialistic of activities. Yet the name has sacred roots: the holy day suggests a time set apart from the ordinary flow of life.

I can to...

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Over the years, London has been the home of many famous writers. Whilst not all of London’s writers were born in the city, many considered it to be the place where they belonged. Here we will talk through some of the famous writers that resided in London and their well-known works of literature