Abby Lyons presents her notes from the most recent meeting of the Nethergate Writers.
Note of the Nethergate Writers Meeting on August 9th 2017
Present: Rosie, Craig, Ray, David C., Roddie, Abby
We began with a discussion of location. Rosie has secured Room 2S11 in the Dalhousie building for each of the NW meetings until October. It was agreed that we should continue to explore other options for when the class with Zoe begins.
We next discussed the two Nethergate Writers proposals being prepared in response to the call for ideas for the Dundee European City of Culture bid.
Proposal 1, written by Roddie aims to deliver 2 projects: one extends the premise of the Watermarks collaboration with Susan Mains, and would involve the creation of new stories and partner films, connecting Dundee to Europe; the second project would seek to complete the 50 Shades of Tay publication, and extend the concept to a competition with school children and a story-mapping exercise.
Proposal 2, drafted by Craig, aims to produce a collaborative anthology of works about living in a European port or river city. Some of the pieces would be written by the Nethergate Writers and other contributions would be sought from writers from one or more of Europe’s other port cities. Due to some uncertainty about the feasibility of the associated Learning Journeys, it was decided that these would be positioned as a possible activity that could be scaled, depending on how engagements with partner cities progressed.
The majority of those present were more comfortable with the scope of Proposal 2, feeling it to be more in keeping with the ambition and capacity of NW. It was agreed that Proposal 2 should be submitted by the NW, and Proposal 1 by Roddie and Susan Mains as a separate endeavour. It was further agreed that the 50 Shades of Tay concept should be retained by the NW, and that the related activity in Roddie’s proposal be re-named.
All present agreed that NW should aim to realise 50 Shades as soon as possible. Action for all – get writing in at least 1 shade!
In the meantime, Roddie is in print! He showed us a copy of the latest New Writing Scotland volume: She Said He Said I Said, in which resides Roddie’s short story, The Snows of Ben Nevis. All were suitably impressed, reverentially handling the book and congratulating Roddie. We noted that former Nethergate Writer, Sarah Isaac, also had a piece published.
Over the 2nd hour, we looked at some of our recent work. David C had written an article which connected our perceptions and interpretation of the weather, the blame game of weather prediction and the somber truth of global warming. As if by magic, Abby had produced a 50 Shades of Tay contribution entitled “For a Tour of Dundee You Could Do Worse Than The 22“. There was a lively discussion about the piece and some suggestions about how to improve it (some of which have already been implemented). Lastly we looked at 3 poems that Roddie was considering submitting to the online poetry publication, Open Mouse. As always, the imagery in each was superb. We quibbled with a word here and there but overall agreed that the poems were certainly good enough and Roddie should go for it.
And with that and a nod from the jannie, it was time to go.
Our next meeting is Aug 23rd, back in the Dalhousie, Rm 2S11, 7-9pm
Hope to see you there,
Abby