• 10:00 AM 12:30 PM

• Sea Acres Rainforest Centre (map)

There is a widespread belief in the power of imagination and creativity to unmake loneliness. To transform our reality to something new, to play with words and paint and ideas to relieve, re-imagine or revitalise the future and the past. What remains of a society is often only the art, the stories that were written down, the marks that were painted.

When children play they are doing exactly what this workshop asks the creative writing student to do. To not judge the prose that is created by rules that they have learned in any other context; to start with just a pen, a page and a desire to reflect on your own individual experience. Your own point of view and experience of something will always be true and unique and what readers crave. A story in which a character takes an idiosyncratic attitude to the Port Macquarie rainforest is always going to be much more interesting than one that appears in a glossy travel brochure.

This writing workshop will encourage you to find a way to play with words and generate your own stories. Expect to spend two hours liberating your self from the ideas of rules within creative writing and experiencing the joy of word play.

TUTOR

Teresa Bell is a writer and teacher based in Port Macquarie. Teresa has a Doctorate in Creative Writing and has published three books, her novel; LUNATION was shortlisted for the 2018 Dorothy Hewett Award and will be released in January.