last night around 30 people sat on astro turf at the wapping project to listen to jeanette winterson read and talk. she read a section from oranges are not the only fruit and a short story about a dog. it was a truly brilliant evening. jen and i had gone to meet up with shannon and beth for a drink and this is almost shannon’s local! the wapping project is a fantastic space – a converted wapping warehouse with lots of the old machinery still in place and a popular restaurant and art space. shame it feels like the other end of the world from ealing…
i wished i had recorded what jeanette had said between readings. it was so profound and needed chewing over. one of the phrases she repeatedly used was about the shining space between the dark and dark – something about the creative process between the struggle of the interior self and the struggle of the exterior world. her life and writing is just such a shining bridge between dark and dark. she also talked about the importance of a writer being a reader. this would be fuel for your own creative writing but not in the sense of being a swot – i.e. turning up the books when needed. more that you were so saturated in the world of writing and ideas that you were able to draw on the residues and memories you were seeped in. i think this applies to all sorts of creative areas – whether a designer, a photographer, an artist, a dj, a liturgist it’s when you are soaked and seeped in the treasures of a particular tradition that you can flow with it creatively. perhaps the quote of the evening for me was
what risks am i taking creatively?
how wonderful. feeling very jealous!
you would have loved it – i was thinking that while i was there!
Jonny – thank you for sharing this. As a fledgling writer I do recognise the need to keep reading as well as being around other creatives who encourage, inspire and with whom I may collaborate. One thing that God has been recently impressing upon me is the need to engage in times of silence and solitude so that my soul (and therefore my creativity) can be preserved, renewed and inspired. It’s akin to one of the oldest stories we know, “In the beginning God created . . .” He did so ‘ex nihilo’ or out of nothing. I think I am beginning to realise that He calls us to do the same. It’s in those spaces of silence and solitude that He is continually – perpetually – making something in me out of that nothingness. In silence and solitude all of my honours, medals, accolades – whatever – is stripped from me and I only bring myself. It’s there that I accumulate the gravitas of becoming that person God dreams I can become rather than my feeble attempts to add value to my life by those things I seek to amass (oftentimes by comparison with others). Creativity is born from the change within me – that work that only the Creator can do – in my moments of releasing it all before He Who Is.
there is a school of life sermon on risk coming up – thought you might be interested http://theschooloflife.com/sermons/risk.aspx
Wapping isn’t the other end of the world from Ealing – it’s the other end of the world from Sydney!! Jeanette was the guest of the Sydney writers festival last year, i got to spend an hour in the concert hall of the opera house. just me, Jeanette, and 2000 other women. i’m sure we’ll both remember it for a long time.