Preachy Vegan
When I was five years old, I walked with my mum past a butcher—a large, blood-red building where fleshy, veiny, bright red cuts of different meat hung on display in the window. Centring the display was a large lamb’s head staring at me. Most human memory begins at age four, so I can still recall the terror and devastation that washed over my tiny body … Continue reading Preachy Vegan
Remembering Sam de Brito: All Men are Liars
‘All men are liars, why won’t you believe me?’ If ever there was an iconic literary question, this, by the late Sam de Brito, could be it. The question, which stemmed from what was to be guided wisdom imparted to his daughter and future children, turned out to be a column. In what was his first Fairfax column, de Brito said, ‘All men are liars. … Continue reading Remembering Sam de Brito: All Men are Liars
Epiphanies, Miracles, and Other Such Nonsense
One might ask (as I am sure many did) just what I was thinking when I quit my job mid-pandemic, decimated my life savings on a trip to far north Queensland via Darwin, arrived home three months later and promptly enrolled at Deakin University. Surely signing up to a lifetime of debt would be the last thing on my mind at 47 and unemployed. If … Continue reading Epiphanies, Miracles, and Other Such Nonsense
Silver Beeches
It was once written that the advent of the railways gave life to the long-forgotten medieval tales of dragons in the countryside. What but for the steam engine—chuffing and puffing its way through the steel arteries of land hitherto untraversed by machine, its fine paintwork glistening in the sun of a golden, modern age—could cause such distress? To stand by the platform of a Victorian … Continue reading Silver Beeches
What I Learned from the World of Fanfiction
My route into the publishing industry was not conventional. In fact, what sparked my interest in the first place was something that has only gained traction online in the last decade or so—fanfiction. I started using Wattpad when I was 15 years old, hungry for those juicy, fictional scenes taken directly from a teenage girl’s mind and splashed onto the site without a second thought. … Continue reading What I Learned from the World of Fanfiction
Getting Inspired into a Career in Screenwriting
One of the initial people that lay the bricks for stories in films and TV, and other entertainment mediums that have become an important part of our daily lives, are the relatively low-profile screenwriters. They receive less recognition than actors, less creative control over what eventually goes on-screen than directors and editors, yet are still demanded the extremely challenging task of writing the foundations of … Continue reading Getting Inspired into a Career in Screenwriting
Lotus Position
I stretch and crack, as the world bends round, mountains and crevices fall. I languish and cry, as locusts explore, upon my skin they crawl. I bend and knot, as the breeze pierces flesh, itchy, numb, and right. I release, a jolt at shutter speed, caught by a nearby mite. I twist and flex, as I’m watched by a crow, rising to praise the dawn. … Continue reading Lotus Position
We Need a Dead Woman to Begin
Content warning: Domestic violence ‘We need a dead woman to begin. To begin (writing, living) we must have death. I like the dead, they are the doorkeepers who while closing one side ‘give’ way to the other. We must have death, but young, present, ferocious, fresh death, the death of the day, today’s death.’ Hélène Cixous (1993) Three Steps on the Ladder of Writing, Columbia … Continue reading We Need a Dead Woman to Begin
Yoga Series Part Two: Breathing Benefits and Study Stress
In this installment of my Yoga Series, I will demonstrate the benefits of conscious breathing for relieving study-related stress. This is essential because regardless of our biases, we all intrinsically rely on the same nourishing life force, our breath. I am not trying to get all woo-woo on you, okay? I am an academic too! I’ve been teaching academically for two decades now. One part … Continue reading Yoga Series Part Two: Breathing Benefits and Study Stress
Provincial Scenery
PrefaceThere was a certain song performed in a film from long ago, one that states what a boon it was to be an Englishman at the dawn of the Edwardian Age. In this so-called ‘Age of Men’, what was ever said of the women? For this reason, it was believed something should be written about the ‘provincial scenery’. That is, the women of Britain who, … Continue reading Provincial Scenery
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