Do you enjoy storytelling?

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 ... storytellers of an earlier time!

Last week I had the opportunity to join fellow writers at a creative writing event.  The event was organised to showcase stories on a local radio station (Wycombe Sound).  I enjoy the radio and I particularly love listening to stories and plays.

It was fun to be part of the audience.  As well as enjoying the literary event, for me, it provided ideas, thinking space and feedback about what makes writing an enjoyable pastime. 

·      How good it is to listen to a story

·      How valuable to hear the rhythm of the words

·      How worthwhile to savour the vocabulary expressed

·      How alive a story becomes when read aloud

·      How the story sounds in different voices and accents

·      How deliberation and intonation can make a character come alive

·      How writing and sharing stories can push us out of our comfort zones

·      How we have preferences for particular types of writing

·      How we can be seduced by new and unusual styles

·      How we can write more creatively learning from others

·      How we tell a different story from the same picture prompt

·      How we fully appreciate the pain of several rewrites

·      How joyful we can be after the final edit!

Creative writing is a great way to capture and share stories – happy stories, sad stories, stories with a moral, stories with a twist and even stories of the tallest kind!  Stories have added benefits of sharing a message.  They amuse and entertain adults and children.  Many stories allow a person to travel for miles without leaving the comfy armchair. Writing and storytelling can be very therapeutic too, in my opinion.

A note of thanks to my new writing friends for an entertaining evening.  I look forward to tuning in to hear their short stories on the radio this week (Friday).  Feel free to join me from wherever you are … invite your writing muse. Who knows what stories may unfold?

Stitched Up

http://www.frasersfotos.com

The Man has been trying out his new camera lens this weekend. I attended a writing workshop and met some lovely people there. This picture captured my imagination for a story.

She stood across the street staring at the window. She knew it would fit perfectly. She just knew it. She had painstakingly sewed every single stitch of that dress under the watchful eye of Madame Fontaine. Madame ensured that all her dressmakers were needlewomen of the highest calibre. Years of training in the fashion houses of Paris meant that when Madame came to London, her expectations were so high that only the best seamstresses were employed in her workrooms. Kitty Delamere worked in Madame’s rooms in Windsor and was one of her finest needlewomen.

“Go on, try it on Kitty, we won’t tell,” shouted Daisy.

“I couldn’t. What if Madame came in?” said Kitty.

“Go on, I dare you, Kitty. We’ll watch out for Madame,” cajoled Esther from across the workroom table.

Kitty had spent weeks stitching the intricate mother of pearl beading onto the bodice and around the neckline. She took great care not to snag the thread or pinprick the silk of this exquisite gown. She held the beautiful white wedding dress in her arms and gently caressed the softness of the material. What a fine gown for a beautiful lady, she thought.

Her thoughts drifted to her own impending wedding to her sweetheart Edward, a war photographer who had been posted to the front line. There had been no correspondence from him for weeks.

“Hurry up, Kitty. Try it on. Pretend that you’re the bride,” giggled Daisy, the youngest seamstress.

With a little help from the girls, Kitty Delamere carefully donned the wedding gown. She took great care not to allow the train of the dress to trail along the workroom floor. It fitted her perfectly, as if it had been made for her. It felt good, really good. She felt elegant and beautiful. She felt like a lady. She wished that Edward could see her. She knew she could never afford one of Madame’s fine gowns on a seamstress’s wage of four shillings a week.

“Oh Kitty, don’t you look a proper lady,” quipped an fascinated Daisy.

The door opened suddenly.

Madame’s tall and wiry frame filled the doorway.

She shrieked loudly in her flowing French accent, “Kitty Dela-meere, the dress, take it off this minute!”

The girls reeled back in horror. Kitty blushed furiously at being caught. She stepped out of the wedding gown and made her way to the office to endure the wrath of the outraged Madame.