Author and poet Rachel Bower: 'Everyone has a story to tell - and I want to help them tell it'
Author and poet Rachel Bower is a firm believer in the idea that everyone has got a story to tell. It’s one of the reasons why, for many years, she has facilitated creative workshops, helping people to explore writing.
She’ll be doing just that at her Getting Started With Fiction session at Ilkley Literature Festival this week, an event aimed at people starting out, returning to writing after a break or wanting to experiment with new storytelling techniques.
Those in attendance will be supported to “escape the terror of the blank page” and get to grips with the building blocks of a story –the characters, dialogue and plot.
“I really believe that everyone's got a story to tell and I think a lot of people don't get a chance to explore that when they're younger, or at school really,” says Bower, a Bradfordian now living in Sheffield. “I wanted to run something that's really accessible in which people can just explore imagination and explore writing stories. Obviously you can't teach everything about fiction in a two-hour workshop...really the idea is to build confidence and let people know that everyone's got a story to tell and that you can tell it.”
A qualified community development worker, Bower has carried out creative workshops with a range of organisations including schools, libraries and youth services. “I wouldn’t want to be a writer writing in isolation,” she says. “Writing community is really important to me, writers supporting each other and supporting people with expressing themselves.
"It might be the first time they've ever been heard or listened to, it might be helpful in terms of having therapeutic benefits and some people I think just by putting something into words can come to terms with things that maybe they haven't really realised before. And so I do a lot of arts and health work.”
There’s lots of time dedicated to her own writing too. Her debut novel It Comes from the River was released earlier this year, exploring the resilience of women and their power to effect change when they work together. At the front of the book is a quote from Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre which mentions the mythical creature ‘the Gytrash’, a dark presence which hovers in the background of each of the women’s stories. Jane, who was told stories of it, describes it as ‘a North-of-England spirit… which in the form of horse, mule or large dog, haunted solitary ways’. Bower explores the folklore, whilst keeping the narrative anchored in the lived experiences of the women.
In another event at Ilkley Literature Festival, she and British-Australian writer Emilia Hart will discuss how they crafted compelling stories of women’s lives in their folklore-inspired fiction. As Bower puts it, “We'll be talking about the way that folklore intersects with women and stories and histories.”
Both events take place on October 11. For more details, visit www.ilkleyliteraturefestival.org.uk