With Anne in the Lucas Arms

Today I attended a writing class with Anne Aylor in the Lucas Arms, an old pub not far from Kings Cross Station. The class was a precious 'time in' with the artist soul. We wrote upstairs, lulled by the creaking pub sign and the smell of burning sage. Anne, a gifted novelist, has a talent for nurturing the embryo writer in others. For a precious day I found myself once more with Thomas Tarling, his charming and courageous woman Mary and the enigmatic leader of the fair, Zackariah Scarrott. 'One's religion,' said J.M. Barrie, is 'whatever one is most interested in'. Today, the religion of the practising writer was extended by a few more hours, in a London pub with the rain beating down on the streets outside.

Out on the Common with Wild Mind

Remembrance Sunday has gone and now we are deep into Autumn. The trees in London’s forests and parks have turned red and the air is crisp as I trot across the Common to the gym. I am deep in thought as I struggle across frost-encrusted grass and prickly gorse, for I am struggling with my novel at present. Everything in me wants to stay at home and sit by the laptop, battling. Yet, this is the worst thing I could do. Sometimes you have to walk away from your writing to walk deep into the heart of what you’re trying to say. As I come out from behind a tree I startle a deer – a magnificent stag. Because I am thinking about my hero Thomas and his battle to find himself, I’m not really looking where I’m going. I just blundered into his territory, a great, flat-footed human, not looking, not thinking. I must have come between the stag and his ladies, for he stands his ground and barks at me. This is dangerous stuff, potentially, but I don’t even notice because I am deep in the untamed, the wild mind. We look at each other. I see something in him, something that can never be broken. He bounds away. I run the last ten minutes to the gym.

Jennifer Pittam is a guest blogger on Eric Maisel's 'Living Creatively'website. Follow her column, 'London Calling': http://ericmaisel.blogspot.com/

I Remember Very Well...

Well! I've come first in the Coast to Coast writing competition, October 2008. My short story, 'I Remember Very Well' was written for Armistice Day, and it was a real boost to have this little bit of success. It's true that success in anything is a series of tiny little efforts, one after the other. Some of them aren't easy. In fact, some of them aren't welcome. The Remembrance Day events were beautifully done this year - the lines of soldiers straight, the brass on the uniforms sparkling in the sun and entire new generations marching or mourning in silence. Some came to remember loved ones who died in Iraq, and some to honour a grandfather or great-uncle lost in one of the world wars. Rows of men and women, people who had to take one little step after the other, mourning a loved one. In bereavement as in writing, in sadness as in joy, it's one step at a time.

Housman's Bookshop

This week I joined a new writers' circle, which meets in the bowels of Housman's Bookshop in Central London. The place is unheated and unbelievably cold even in this rather mild winter. As we huddled around a single bar electric fire I was, I admit, re-connected to the pre-centrally heated days of my childhood. Yet, there is something very focussing about sitting in semi darkness, coat pulled around your shoulders, munching custard creams and reading a chapter from your novel. When I listed to the others' stories, focussing a hundred percent because after all, what else can you do in semi darkness, I found myself utterly captivated by the different worlds they led me into. Call me old fashioned, but I wondered whether we've lost something precious, sitting here in the 21st century, enjoying luxuries our ancestors would have associated with the idle rich. Maybe I've turned into my mother after all.

Death in the Family

A beloved auntie died this weekend, nine years to the day when we lost my uncle. Woke up feeling ragged and with a thick head, and wondered whether I'd be able to write at all. In cases of very devastating bereavement, people do say they can't write. I found that the day needed care, and to some extent I was 'going through the motions.' I took a trip to the Museum of London, a place that has inspired a lot of my writing in the past. The inspiration wasn't there today, at first, but I wandered around the galleries, just allowing myself to 'be,' and not require myself to 'do.' They were playing a 17th century folksong in the museum, which mentioned Charing Cross. This was quite serendipitous, because Charing Cross features heavily in my current chapter. Last week I researched and discovered that the current cross is a replacement for the original Queen Eleanor Cross, erected in the mid-19th century. I'd been all through my manuscript changing every incidence of 'Charing Cross' to 'Queen Eleanor Cross,' and when I got home I changed them all back.

Research, Research, Research

Just got back from a brilliant research trip in Bath. I've been travelling quite cheaply, staying in the smallest room in a convenient hotel and getting the feeling of 'being on the road'. In order to connect to my characters' lives as best I could, I visited several museums, imagining what it would have been like to use all the implements, wear the clothes and be at the mercy of the medicines and the food. Also I had a lot of help from the glassblowers' studio by the river, who told me all about the dangers and joys of handblown glass. I did several pathworkings, made sketches and produced some awful watercolours. Some days I sat by the River Avon and gave myself a rest. One thing I did experience was the loneliness of the road, and also the effects of the weather - when I got drenched in the rain it took a real effort to keep my spirits up. How much worse must it be if your livelihood depends on the sunshine. It's really easy to write in a grotty hotel room - in fact, working on my novel was the main thing that kept me sane when the nights drew in and I missed home the most.

Chigwell Row Wood

Today I had the curious experience of seeing myself on TV. The programme was filmed in Chigwell Row Wood, which is a part of Epping Forest. In the film I talked about my ancestor, Tom Tarling, and life in 19th century England when a working man's only real asset was his fists, for his trade barely furnished enough to put bacon on the table. It was a salutary experience, to talk it through for the camera. After, I came away with renewed respect for that man, rough and ready no doubt, who bought himself a wagon and a horse, or two, from the sweat of his own brow. No credit cards in those days. Writing Chapter 7 was a deeper, more meaningful experience for having explored Tom's dilemma for the purposes of fiction and I have had a good weekend at the writing, even if I have been over the same three paragraphs 83 times!