“I don’t know why any of us write. It’s horrible. But also glorious. So what are we to do?” With candour, humour and perhaps one too many mentions of wee, Stranger’s creative director and partner Clare Howdle took to the Penzance Literary Festival stage this month to talk about the craft of fiction writing and her story in the ‘Twelve Stories for Twelve Sections’ anthology, published earlier this year.
A collaboration between Cornwall National Landscape and Hermitage Press, the anthology celebrates each of Cornwall’s 12 designated sections of outstanding natural beauty with stories commissioned from some of the county’s most notable contemporary writers.
In conversation with publisher Paul Taylor-McCartney, Clare spoke with anthology editor and author Gareth Rees and author and screenwriter Jane Pugh about how Cornwall’s landscape inspires storytelling, the character landscape brings to story, the complexities that come with writing about a place like Cornwall and the specifics of whether to use or reject speech marks.
For those of you that missed the talk, check out the ‘best bits’ edit for all the insights.
+
Buy your copy of ‘Twelve Stories for Twelve Sections’