Author | Writer | Photographer
Is it good business to write for free? Simon Whaley explores the value of your words.
Picture the scene: an email pops into your inbox. The editor loves your submission and wants to publish it. Sadly, there’s no budget to pay contributors, but it’s a great opportunity to see your name in print, and it’ll give you a piece to put in your published portfolio. So, what do you do?
If you can get hold of a copy of The People’s Friend, dated 21st March 2015, then check out the feature exploring the life of an Age UK charity …
This letter appears in the Spring 2015 issue of the Society of Author’s journal: The Author
A Positively Productive Writing Career was first published in the Spring 2014 issue of Writers’ Wheel, and neatly summarises my writing career up until this point. To download a free …
My latest batch of Age UK photos has been published in The People’s Friend magazine. They’re such a lovely team at the Newport, Shropshire shop, and they are all fantastically friendly, especially when they hate having their photos taken! Mind you, I can understand their reticence. When you give up your time to volunteer in a charity shop you don’t expect to find yourself as a magazine model strutting your stuff in front of over 400,000 readers.
Last Wednesday evening I attended a public meeting organised by the Support Group of my local library, and I was delighted to see so many people there. Over 200 people forced themselves into the hall to hear what was said. And emotions ran high. Whilst this isn’t always a good thing, because it detracts from the actual consultation process, it was an indication of the support that exists in the town for the library.
Ninety years ago Clough Williams-Ellis acquired the site that became Portmeirion. Simon Whaley discovers how Country Life came to influence the way it looks today.
If it wasn’t for COUNTRY LIFE magazine Portmeirion would look a little different today. Ninety years ago, Bertram Clough Williams-Ellis invested less than £5,000 acquiring the land where he would build Portmeirion, but in 1925 it was known as Aber Iâ. He wanted a more romantic name and decided that he could draw upon it’s coastal location, which had the air of a port about it, and use the Welsh name of the county in which is was located (Merioneth): hence Portmeirion. His architectural concept of creating a coastal village had begun, a concept that would take 51 years to evolve. Although he made plans for his village, which appeared in The Architects Journal in 1926, it’s construction was an evolutionary process, for his plans did not include the finds he would make amongst COUNTRY LIFE’s pages in the years ahead.
My latest article for Writer’s Wheel, the online magazine for writers, is entitled Course You Can and looks at how to make the most from a residential writing workshop. You …
Slow Journey County: Cumbria
Slow Journey Destination: Claife Heights
Slow Journey Distance Travelled: 0 Steps.
My immediate thought was of radioactivity. It was a series of unmistakable clicks. But where from? Standing on Claife Heights, overlooking Beatrix Potter’s favourite tarn (Moss Eccles), I was puzzled by this noise. The air was still, the tarn’s waters reflective, and a cold wintry sun sat low on the horizon, as if still trying to warm itself up, let alone anything else.
The Erewash Writers’ Short Story competition has just been launched for 2015, and they’ve kindly asked me to judge. Top prize is £100, and all profits from the competition go …