I've been away for the weekend to stay with my friends in Essex. I go down quite often, usually on the coach, and I'm always full of good intentions to write while I'm travelling. It takes quite a while to get there, 5 hours down on the coach (I have to change in Birmingham) and then an hour on the Underground from Victoria. The train is quicker but more expensive, and to be honest more of a hassle. It takes me nearly as long to travel out of London on the 3 tubes (or 2 tubes and a train) I need to use from Euston as it does to get down to London on the train in the first place!
My handwriting is bad at the best of times, and it looks like spidery shorthand when I write on the coach so I tend to make notes rather than try and write the story itself. Part of it takes place in London and, as I don't know the city at all, travelling through on the coach gives me a good opportunity to make notes on my surroundings.
I just write a few words about the people I see walking past; the shops, cafes and restaurants; the stone carvings on the old buildings that nobody notices; the parks and the traffic. Stuff like that.
Most of the story is based in Essex and I get to see the local countryside as well when I'm travelling through on the tube. It really surprised me the first time I used it when I went to stay with my friends. I always thought of the Underground as being...well...underground, but on the District Line (and probably the others too) once the tube reaches a certain point out of the main part of the City it appears above ground and carries on just like a normal train.
I'd really like to visit Manningtree in Essex where Matthew Hopkins, the so-called Witchfinder General, lived in 1644. He was responsible for several hundred woman being executed after they were accused of witchcraft. I haven't been able to persuade my friends yet that it would be a good place for a grand day out, and I don't know why!! Maybe next summer we can go there and have a picnic.
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5 comments:
Yea! You're writing again! Your trip sounded great and the Muse was with you, congrats!!!
I like writing but it seems that I do all my writing on the Internet lately. Well, at least someone is reading a few things I write. Mostly just a lot of mumble jumbo stuff.
I'm really going to have to be stern with myself and write as much as I can, even if it's all rubbish. I need to keep it going.
Thanks for coming here to post :-)
I've been looking about in your archives, it's very entertaining!
I did an introductory 'Writing and Publishing' college course last year that covered the process from the initial planning to contacting prospective publishers, to self-publishing your own work. I enjoyed it a lot, but I'd like to do a course now that concentrates on the creative writing process itself.
There isn't another evening class at my local college, only a daytime one. My tutor from the W&P course runs a writing group which sounds really good, but only in the daytime because he lectures at night.
The only one I could find was an Open University online course and at @ £100 for a course lasting just a few weeks - I don't think so!!
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