Stories and books are what make us human

Ruth Hartley Storytelling, Books by Ruth Hartley, Festival, Film, Promotion, Reading, Southern Africa, Writing Process1 Comment

The importance of books This Saturday, I’m at the Au’Tour du Livre book festival in the nearby town of Vic en Bigorre behind a table loaded with my books. I’ll be hoping for readers and I’ll be talking to writers I know. Last weekend I spent magic moments hunting through boxes of second-hand books at the Amis des Animaux fete. […]

Tall stories, true stories, lies, fiction, facts and truth-telling

Ruth Hartley Storytelling, Apartheid, Books by Ruth Hartley, Family, Memoir, Poetry, Reading, South Africa, Southern Africa, The Love and Wisdom Crimes, The Spiral-Bound Notebooks, When I Was Bad, Writing ProcessLeave a Comment

Writing fictions, memoirs and versions of my truth In the last few months I have published three books. The first is a novel, the second is a book of poetry, the inspiration on which the novel is based and the third is a memoir. They are – The Love and Wisdom Crimes A coming-of-age adventure story about a young white […]

Words, the power of words and the work of wordsmiths

Ruth HartleyBooks by Ruth Hartley, Creativity, Politics, Power, Religion, Writing Process, Zambia2 Comments

“For magic consists in this, the true naming of a thing.” ― Ursula K. Le Guin, A Wizard of Earthsea Words and editing I’m engaged in a major rewrite of my children’s book The Drought Witch. It’s an exciting task expanding a children’s picture book into a novel for 9 to13-year-olds but the interesting work is in the editing and […]

Stories about wars that stop us remembering to forget

Ruth Hartley Storytelling, Migration, Politics, Power, Race, Racism, Southern Africa, The Shaping of Water, The Tin Heart Gold Mine, The White and Black Blues, Truth, Visual Arts, War, Writing Process7 Comments

Black Cowboys in the Wild West and African-American soldiers in WW2 There are facts we don’t know and facts we choose not to know because they don’t suit us. There are facts that are hidden from us by politicians and power-hungry people and there are facts which are distorted by the media, by myth-makers, advertisers and film makers. When it […]

Hop, skip and jump to the heartbeat of life

Ruth HartleyArt Process, Creativity, Family, Imagination, Poetry, Songs, Writing Process5 Comments

The Child in the Garden The child in the garden goes hop, skip and jump and sings to herself. She dances her world into being. The garden is dusty, dry sand, withered leaves and sharp-edged stones. The child draws in the dirt. The garden is a clearing in a forest, a marketplace of musical insects, a place where snakes wait […]