Is White Writing Black, Right Writing or Wrong Writing?

Ruth Hartley Storytelling, Politics, Race, Southern Africa, The Tin Heart Gold Mine8 Comments

Writing black and white people, men and women, good and bad. This is a rewrite of post on Marginal Scribbling that contains some complicated ideas that need thrashing out with other writers and readers. I intended to repost this anyway but it seemed more relevant after the launch of my novel The Tin Heart Gold Mine because I was asked […]

Photo Children

Ruth HartleyFamily, Journey, Photography2 Comments

I don’t change but the photos of my children grow younger all the time. My children are ageless too but their recorded images alter every year The photo children become thin or fat They wear braces or smiles, spectacles or scowls. Their hair is straight or curled, but in their present flesh they are constant. My heart holds them so, […]

All the world’s a wedding

Ruth HartleyFamily13 Comments

What is a Marriage? Marriage- a formal agreement between two people – the ceremony in which this agreement is made – the state of being married. Wedding – a marriage ceremony. Women and men are equal in law and in marriage. “Love doesn’t just sit there, like a stone, it has to be made, like bread; remade all the time,  […]

Storytellers, readers, writers and reviews

Ruth Hartley Storytelling, The Shaping of Water, The Tin Heart Gold Mine2 Comments

We are all storytellers. We are all readers. Some of us are writers. Not all readers write reviews but all writers need reviews and even bad ones mean that we have been noticed and read. In this post, I am going to tell you in a 4 short paragraphs, about 4 books that have given me great pleasure and that […]

My story, is it a memoir, an autobiography, or a novel?

Ruth Hartley Storytelling, Graphic Novel, Memoir, The Tin Heart Gold Mine, Writing Process4 Comments

What is my novel? “How much of your novel is an autobiography?” It’s a good question to ask a writer. A good question It was asked at the launch of The Tin Heart Gold Mine, but it’s not a simple question to answer. I immediately wanted to ask the other writers there what they thought. It’s easier to answer this […]