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Barbara Henderson, Author at The Open College of the Arts - Page 4 of 5

To find out more details about the transfer to The Open University see A New Chapter for OCA.

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Barbara Henderson


To Read or Not to Read… thumb

To Read or Not to Read…

‘Which should I do? Read, or write?… There’s not much of a record, in the memoirs of writers, about the tension I have just described, the silent competition between reading and writing. I don’t know if many writers feel it. I do know some writers seem to resent reading, to resent literature even – as if it were unfair competition.’

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Adaptations – A Thing Apart! thumb

Adaptations – A Thing Apart!

‘If you really love a book and become involved in it, you almost have a film in your head. Someone else’s interpretation can be disconcerting and disappointing, so best to view them separately.’
What are the best screen adaptations of a book? And the worst? Let me know!

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Show Some Emotion thumb

Show Some Emotion

There is a recurring issue I notice when reading through students’ work on all the creative courses I’ve taught.
It is a flatness to the writing, brought about by a reluctance to show emotion in a character.

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A Radical Past thumb

A Radical Past

There is something of an assumption made about children’s historical time fantasy. It is that it is a generally conservative genre (or sub-genre, depending on your point of view).

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Questions, questions thumb

Questions, questions

I’m becoming very aware of the questions that interest readers. It’s perhaps not surprising that the same questions come up again and again. What is surprising is the nature of those common themes and just how many readers are concerned with issues that to the author seem, at best, tangential.

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Seeing yourself in a story thumb

Seeing yourself in a story

Have you ever seen ‘yourself’ in a book?

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Genre Fiction Strikes Back thumb

Genre Fiction Strikes Back

The world of writing has always had its class system…

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Write what you (don’t want to) know… thumb

Write what you (don’t want to) know…

Barbara on confronting your fears…

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Editing as Medicine for Writers thumb

Editing as Medicine for Writers

Editing: is it like forcing down the spinach?

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Keep that Commonplace Book about you thumb

Keep that Commonplace Book about you

I was cleaning the stairs. It really isn’t the sort of activity where you would expect inspiration to strike. But that’s what I was doing, polish and duster in hand, when two part-formed ideas merged and, very quickly, I worked out the main plot of my children’s novel, The Serpent House. Ideas for stories catch […]

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