P L A Y S P A C E N E W S JANUARY 2020
FAIL
after William Stafford and Samuel Beckett
try then fail
try again
fail again
now lower your standards
then try again
fail better
try again harder
fail safer
try one more time
fail much better
now lower your standards
even further
APOLOGY
Some of you may have bought and read a faulty copy of Brushes with War. All the words are correct and in the correct order, but the formatting leaped ahead by a couple of lines on a few pages when we made a few final corrections before sending the manuscript to the printers.
Lesson: check, double check, and insist on a proof copy before the print run. Check again.
Remember Tom Leonard
re-launch of out-of-print books with readings, songs, and film including Gerrie Fellows, Gerry Loose, Tam Dean Burn, Eddie Linden, Allan Tall, Gerry Mangan, Jane Goldman and others
25th April 5pm to 7pm at the CCA – 350 Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow
Booking essential
L i v i n g O u r D y i n g
This book demystifies death and dying, encouraging people to see this as an enriching dimension of our story, enabling them to talk and think more frankly and helpfully about what is often a taboo subject.
Living Our Dying offers a fuller engagement with death, both before and after the event: pain, fears and anxieties, loss of dreams, residential care, funerals, eulogies, epitaphs, poems and songs, memorials, hospice care. It is a practical approach to and philosophy of dying, expressed by twenty-three different writers.
We are looking for a publisher for Living Our Dying which offers a fuller engagement with death, both before and after the event: pain, fears and anxieties, loss of dreams, residential care, funerals, eulogies, epitaphs, poems and songs, memorials, hospice care. It is a practical approach to and philosophy of dying, expressed by twenty-three different writers.
This book will give the readers greater mental control of their own dying, enable them to cope with it a bit better, and perhaps be more helpful both to friends and loved ones who are dying and to those who will survive them. Dying is part of life and it is fundamentally important how we live it and what we do when someone we know has died.
Dying is part of life and it is fundamentally important how we live it and what we do when someone we know has died.
We die. That may be the meaning of our lives.of life.
But we do language. That may be the measure
Toni Morrison
If we don’t find a publisher within the next six months – by June 2020 – PlaySpace will publish a limited edition by subscription and with crowd funding.
by Max Mackay-James, Larry Butler, James King, and Kim Stafford
. . . .Is this you splitting apart, dividing yourself into little pieces ready to be scattered after you die? Is there another way, a gradual decline, a positive de-motion? Or can we raise our game when we reach a certain age? Let’s leap into left field beyond all ideas or right or wrong ways of being in the world, of getting older. Let’s play . . . .
PlaySpace will have a bookstall at the Poetry Market
Saturday 7th March from 12noon until 4pm.
Writing for Health & Wellbeing
in the Kibble Palace
Glasgow Botanic Gardens
Many people find using journals, poems and words helps them to understand and find new ways of coping with stress and illness. Lapidus Scotland offers writing workshops which are open to all abilities. They are mostly about ‘getting things down on paper’ and not worrying too much about spelling and grammar. No previous experience needed.
A useful way into writing can be through keeping a journal, as it can provide a private place to express thoughts and feelings. In Writing for Health and Wellbeing we explore the ways in which words and writing can inspire and help us through difficult times and beyond.
Winter to Spring workshops on Wednesdays
5th, 12th,26th Feb,4th, 11trh, and 25th March 2020
12:30 to 2:30pm
Further information and to book a place
email: lapidus.scotland.1@gmail
Many people find using journals, poems and words helps them to understand and find new ways of coping with cancer. The Glasgow Maggie’s Centre offers writing workshops which are open to all abilities. They are mostly about ‘getting things down on paper’ and not worrying too much about spelling and grammar.
A useful way into writing can be through keeping a journal, as it can provide a private place to express thoughts and feelings.
In Writing for Health and Wellbeing we explore the ways in which words and writing can inspire and help us through difficult times and beyond.
Writing for Health & Wellbeing Workshops
Beginning Thursday 27th February 2020 for six sessions
Thursdays 11:45am to 1:45pm
Please contact the Maggie’s Centre to reserve a place
Tel: 0141 357 2269 email: glasgow@maggiescentres.org
If you’ve been to Dhanakosa by Loch Voil, this is an Invitation to contribute to a book of poems, stories and anecdotes inspired by this place and the surrounding area. Sales of the book will be donated to the Dhanakosa charity.
Please send your contribution by the 30th June 2020 by email to playspacepublications@gmail.com
Guideline:
1. Up to three poems
2. short stories or anecdotes up to 300 words
3. send both a word doc and a pdf
B E A F R A I D B E V E R Y A F R A I D
FEARS ARE GREAT motivators, especially for writers. Much of our strongest material comes from what we are afraid of. When you call up your fears in ritual or prayer you also call up protective forces. It is the same with writing. In fact, the act of writing is what protects you. It’s like homeopathic medicine. You take small doses of your fears in combination with written words and they create a kind of antibody: a cathartic human experience that authenticates your strength and fragility.
TRY making a list of all the things you fear. Pick one and describe it in concrete and specific detail.
What I fear in writing is the safe decision.
Anne Rice
PlaySpace Publications 