Online and in person creative writing workshop with Yvonne Battle-Felton
Sarah-Clare Conlon, Literature Editor
The Leeds Library’s Speaking To The Shelves programme includes a series of creative writing sessions, taking place both online and in the library. When the programme’s curator Becky Cherriman asked established writers and workshop leaders to design writing activities around texts they considered part of the literary canon, she expected some surprises. The writers did not disappoint and this month you’re invited to join author Yvonne Battle-Felton as she tilts Madeleine L’Engle’s science-fiction novel A Swiftly Tilting Planet, encouraging writers to respond in the genre of their choosing.
When the programme’s curator Becky Cherriman asked established writers and workshop leaders to design writing activities around texts they considered part of the literary canon, she expected some surprises.
Yvonne Battle-Felton, author of Remembered, is an author, academic, host and creative producer; she also writes for children. Remembered was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction in 2019 and shortlisted for the Jhalak Prize in 2020. Winner of a Northern Writers Award in fiction (2017), Yvonne was awarded a Society of Author’s Foundation Grant for Remembered in 2018. Yvonne has a PhD in creative writing from Lancaster University and is Principal Lecturer—Business and Enterprise Lead at Sheffield Hallam University.
Curator Becky Cherriman is a Yorkshire writer, workshop leader and performer. She works part-time as co-leader of the creative writing pathway at The University of Leeds Lifelong Learning Centre. Published by Seren, Mslexia, New Walk, Envoi, Bloodaxe, Well Versed, Moving Worlds and The North, she was resident poet for Morley Literature Festival in 2013 and lead artist for Altofts Festival In A Day 2016. Echolocation, her first poetry pamphlet, and first collection Empires of Clay were published in 2016 by Mother’s Milk and Cinnamon Press respectively. Her agnostic poem ‘Jesus Lives’ was highly commended in the Forward Prizes 2017.
You don’t need to have read A Swiftly Tilting Planet beforehand as extracts from the novel will be provided in the workshops. Joining online? The workshop takes place via Zoom. The programme is supported by funding from Leeds Inspired, part of Leeds City Council.
