Swanwick 2025 - Stepping Down

It's that wonderful time of year again, and I'm not talking about Christmas (even though one store has been selling mince pies since July). I am of course talking about my annual visit to the Writers' Summer School, known to its attendees as "Swanwick". This was my ninth visit to the school, along with my fourth and final year on the school committee (I'm required to step away after serving for four consecutive years). Well, I can't be running around switching on microphones and screens forever.

A farewell to arms

As always, Swanwick offers a wide array of courses, with no obligation to attend if you just want to sit and write or socialise with other creative minds (and notorious procrastinators like myself). Course sessions are roughly an hour long and broken down into three categories: the four-part "Specialist Courses", two-part "Short Courses", and single session "Workshops".

Ultimately, I didn't attend as many courses this year. Tech can get stressful, and I wanted to give myself some time to write so I'd often set up the rooms and then go back to the lounge. Having said that, the courses I did attend were truly fantastic.

For my specialist course this year, I attended "Writing Short Stories" by Della Galton, although I was only able to commit to the first two sessions on the Sunday morning. There was an interesting exercise on titles, and discussions about where to submit. A mention of writing a Christmas story gave me an idea for my comic fantasy setting Misadventures in Planaterra (also known as The Bayfalls), so I might work on that.

The short courses I attended this year were "How to Write for Screen" with Izzy Searle and "Writing the Rainbow" with Eden Stokes. Despite dealing with the annual Curse of the Tissington Room Right Screen in one session and sun's unbearable greenhouse effect on the room, both courses were fascinating. "How to Write for Screen" served as a great refresher on writing scripts, including formatting. I wrote a screenplay for my dissertation five years ago, and was inspired to revisit that. Suffice to say, it requires a major overhaul, but it was nice to be able to sit in the lounge. "Write the Rainbow" served as an excellent pointer on writing LGBTQ+ characters. He looked at some of the tropes and cliches to avoid, along with ways to invert them. I formally established in my story "The Pirate King" that Kestrel and Scar are bisexual, but I also sketched out a gay character in another story of theirs I've been drafting.

I only attended one workshop this year, and that was "Cosy Fantasy" with Elizabeth Hopkinson. I'm not too familiar with the concept of Cosy Fantasy, but I hoped to gain a few ideas for The Bayfalls. Despite a few technical hitches, the session involved a worldbuilding session using the TTRPG Wanderhome, and ultimately felt rather quaint.

Of course, there's more to Swanwick than the courses. Each night had an array of evening events, which included poetry and prose open mics, a busker's night, a quiz, and a fancy dress disco with a Wild West theme. I attended the prose open mic, which I mainly spent gesticulating at readers to stand closer to the mics (one of which wouldn't pick up sound if you tried eating it). I also opened the poetry open mic, taking the opportunity to read some of my more risque poems about capitalist workaholic culture and my Andor-inspired dying wish.

The final night also had a performance of Izzy Searle's play "Baggy Bra", a short comedy set in a bra shop intended to raise awareness for Against Breast Cancer's bra recycling scheme. While acoustics weren't the best with what tech was functional, I still got some laughs out of the quickfire dialogue. This was followed by a fire pit singalong, where I performed a rendition of "Red River Valley".

I didn't get much of an opportunity to give a farewell speech, although I didn't exactly have one prepared. I'll say that it's been a great honour to have served the committee for the last four years, but all good things must come to an end. I'd love to come back to Swanwick, but I can't guarantee it due to the financial commitment. If the job situation changes for the better, I might be able to commit to a future school. It will be a real shame to not make next year, because there's a lot of longtime delegates who have grown accustomed to having me around.

To quote Gandalf in Lord of the Rings: "I will not say do not weep. For not all tears are an evil."