As we get ready to celebrate our 234th anniversary on 18 May, a recent RLF grant beneficiary takes a deep dive into the background of a fellow Welshman and minister who founded the RLF in 1790 – Reverend David Williams. Originally written for the Welsh-language magazine Barddas, the English translation of this article originally appeared…
I am a writer looking to be re-homed. All I need is a laptop, a table and a chair, and preferably silence or at least, banal noise, nothing too exciting. Lately I have been associating my usual writing space with all sorts of bad karma — a play which didn’t work no matter what I…
Publishing RLF Fellow Tom Lee’s new book, The Bullet, his memoir about family and mental health, has recently been published by Granta Books: Like many people, Tom Lee remembers the presence – somewhere out of sight, on the outskirts of town – of the local psychiatric hospital. It was a place that inspired jokes, rumours…
To mark the first anniversary of Their Majesties’ Coronation, it has been announced Her Majesty The Queen will take on patronage of the Royal Literary Fund from the late Queen Elizabeth II, who was Patron of 492 organisations at the time of her death. Only 376 organisations will be retained by Their Majesties or other…
The first issue of The Review by WritersMosaic & Jhalak is out today. The Review is an editorially independent, 20-page biannual literary journal, produced by and featuring writers of the global majority, available as an insert in The Bookseller, the UK’s main book trade magazine. While its placement in The Bookseller ensures visibility to the…
I shouldn’t be here. No, I didn’t have a near-death experience; it was Glasgow that almost died, bulldozed into oblivion. This large, lovely, light-filled flat stood in the way of progress, or, more precisely, the path of a proposed motorway approach-road. It was the early seventies and the promised land could be glimpsed just across…
Memoirs are as much about what is excluded as what is included. This edition examines how you can evoke the truth in writing memoirs whilst drawing on memories that are sometimes fallible or contested.
Publishing News RLF Fellow Trish Cooke’s new children’s book, The Magic Callaloo, is set to be published by Walker Books on 4th April. Illustrated by Sophie Bass, The Magic Callaloo is based on the fairytale Rapunzel and inspired by stories of enslaved Africans, in a vibrant story of community, magic, love and family. Trish says:…
I’ve always known that I’ve preferred to be outside. To be an outsider – literally, and, specifically, amongst wild places – has been my preferred state so that with every project, I’ve packed my pen and paper, and headed out. This love of the outdoors has always shown itself in my work. Since the beginning…
“There are two ways to lose oneself: by segregation in the particular or by dilution in the ‘universal’.” — Aimé Césaire (Lettre à Maurice Thorez, 1956). In 1977 I was nine when my Dad told me we were going to live in Nigeria. Up until that point, Nigeria was a place my brother and I…
Dreda Say Mitchell is a best-selling and award-winning author appointed an MBE by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth for her services to literature and education work in prisons. She received the CWA’s John Creasey Dagger in 2004, the first time a Black British author has received this honour. She writes across the crime and mystery genre…
Paula Hawkins worked as a journalist for fifteen years before turning to fiction. She is the author of two #1 New York Times bestselling novels, Into The Water and The Girl on The Train. An international #1 bestseller, The Girl on the Train has sold 23 million copies worldwide and has been adapted into a major motion picture. Her third thriller, A Slow Fire Burning,…
