Being the descendent of a famous poet has its drawbacks – the greatest of which is, I believe, the inhibiting impact it has on one’s own urges to put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard). Nevertheless, I have written poems over the years and, more recently a number of ‘monologues’ (some more fictional than others). My outputs to date are far from Victorian in style – though maybe they have an element of ‘in memoriam’.

Writing comes easily… actually words come easily (a point often made by those I have trained or facilitated) but exactly what form my attempts at creative writing should take has been elusive – until I realised that it is quite legitimate to write
in any number of formats!

The brief biography of my father (written in the aftermath of his murder in 2005) sat on a shelf gathering dust. Did I write it for his grandchildren (the stated aim), or for me (as a form of therapy), or for a wider audience? And if the latter, what audience? Is it a potential radio play? A dramatic monologue? A prose poem? A novella? Maybe it will become clear or maybe the dust will just settle.

These – and other – questions about my writing have reverberated over time but have recently been resolved into my new publication (of which more below) which I think was prompted, consciously or unconsciously, by what the novelist Elif Shafak describes in her book HONOUR:

“The past is like a trunk in the loft, crammed with scraps, some valuable,
but many entirely useless. Although I’d prefer to keep it closed,
the slightest breeze throws it open, and, before I know it, all the contents
have flown everywhere. I put them back. One by one.
The memories, the bad and the good.
Yet the trunk always snaps open again when I least expect it.”

So wisely or unwisely (time will tell) I have recently put together a publication of some of my writings clustered under different headings to distinguish fact from fiction – though the more I review them, the less confident I am that it is possible to distinguish so neatly!

The title of the book is a quote from IN MEMORIAM by Alfred Tennyson (so I guess this suggests that he has had more influence on my life despite what I claim above!):

“For words, like nature, half reveal and half conceal the soul within”

 

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REVEALING & CONCEALING – Table of Contents

 

Introduction

Fragments from my life

True stories

• Becoming German
• Experiments in shared living
• Triumvirates never work
• And you, my father

Truth-based Fiction

• Neural pathways
• The name of the dog
• A wife like the moon

Monologues

• Home is a mobile phone
• To dye or not to dye
• Episodes from a holiday in Italy
• Masks must be worn at all times

Poems

• Aldeburgh beach
• I email, therefore I am
• Keeping in touch
• Candlelight
• Piece for a storm-tossed heart
• Being the wind
• Ashes

For a copy of the book contact me:
ros@rostennyson.info