DISQUS

Isabel Adonis · 3 months ago

Funny coming across this blog today. Yesterday as the last of my progeny left home for college I said to my partner, I want to go to college too to do an MA in Creative Writing. Perhaps I thought I might get a job in America! Duh!

I really like the small town where I live on the North Wales coast but there is no intellectual life to speak of. If only I could go to college, I might meet some like minded souls, communicate and be inspired. I didn't really know if I wanted to be a student though. In some ways I want to be a teacher of writing, but I'm not truly qualified for either. For one thing I don't have that kind of money and am unwilling at this time in my life to get into more debt. Having a mortgage around my neck is quite bad enough.

I've done a great deal of writing as well - I used it to save my life or transform it. Both. Most of it is posted on the internet. I've written a manuscript called 'Black Girl' and a novel called 'And' based on the lives of my parents. No-one in Wales will publish it and I'm told 'why don't I just call myself Welsh and have done with it.'

Not quite sure why I'm telling you this. You don't want to rely too much on ''them''. Creativity comes into being despite them and everybody else for that matter.

I don't mind giving you some feedback...I'm just another one of Them though...not really! Smile.

best

Isabel.

Paul Boakye · 3 months ago

A couple of my London friends have recently taken up employment in New York City after job-hunting from the UK for over 18 months. So, it isn't impossible. One even took a job with the UN.

I think you'd have to decide whether an MA would really change your life significantly. There are all kinds of bursaries, grants, and soft loans you could get. Not that I was eligible for one myself, but maybe I didn't exhaust the possibilities. During a recession is the best time to go off and study. Since you already have a body of creative writing work to fine-tune as part of your degree programme, it should make the whole process a breeze.

I'm not really in the habit of thinking of "them" and "us" in the sense I think you mean it. Some of the people I trust most to critique my writing know more about black literary traditions than either me or you, and they're not one of "us."

Maybe you should send a few chapters of your novel to one or two agents outside of Wales. The Writers' and Artists' Yearbook 2010 is a good place to start.

Isabel Adonis · 3 months ago

It may well be a waste of time in responding to this unfriendly and patronising post from you.

Your earlier post - an MA in 10 months, confirmed to me that while I was now free enough to entertain doing courses that this was in all likelihood a phantasy, for the very reasons you yourself gave.

I read and understood your position, quite well, I think and I put it to you that I was now in a position to offer some cultural exchange. I have a bit more time on my hands. I was not asking for advice on how to publish my work. I was merely exposing my own ennui about writing.

I was offering a hand of friendship, but also pointing out that by reading your work I may also become an 'authority' of one kind or another. I was making light of this - the separation between writer and reader.

You cannot possibly know what I know about black literary traditions...give me a break.

Isabel.

Jack · 3 months ago

That's a bit harsh, love. Don't see where you're coming from if you're replying to the previous comment to your post. You sound unnecessarily angry to me.

Paul Boakye · 3 months ago

I'm sorry if you found my reply to you unfriendly and patronising, Isabel, that was NOT my intention. I was trying to be helpful in light of what you said about your work, Wales, finances, etc. I recently sought cultural exchange in the classroom, I have enough of it in my personal life through friends and others who are literary professors in America, Africa and the Caribbean. Thank you for the hand of friendship and for your kind offer to read my work.

Isabel Adonis · 3 months ago

Using shopping while black as metaphor - you take the place of the white guy who thinks he has power on his side and who feels free to frisk the black woman and ask her to leave the shop. Both interestingly are in the position of 'helping'!?

You were not merely helping me and I am not interested in your apology. Using race and blackness as an issue you are asking me to leave your shop. Not once mind you, but twice. You don't just have professors in Africa, you have them in America too. No doubt you have them in heaven too! All this while having no idea who I know or don't know.

I hope you can live with yourself...
Isabel.