About THIS EVENT
How can we use diverse genres to break through denial, challenge assumptions and inspire new thinking? Take a romp across genres with a lively panel discussion and practical exercises.
“Tell all the Truth but tell it Slant” Emily Dickinson
From historical to sci-fi, horror to fairytale, every genre of writing offers different slants on the truths of eco-crisis and injustice. Genre-writing has long been used to resist oppression, subvert the status quo and share radical ideas with new audiences.
This session brings together rebellious writers to discuss how we can use diverse genres to break through denial, challenge assumptions and inspire new thinking. Through a lively panel discussion and practical exercise, we’ll take a romp across genres, try writing beyond our comfort zones, and explore techniques to engage readers—slant-wise—with painful truths.
What We'll Explore
How to avoid preachiness and engage readers’ emotions
How inspiring writers have used genres to “fly under the radar” in resisting oppression
How every genre offers tools and techniques we can mobilise
Skills in writing in genres you may never have tried before
What You'll Get
A panel discussion with amazing genre writers (panel TBC) as well as exercises to get your writing moving
Who You Are
A writer who wants to explore new ways of telling stories
A writer who wants to explore more about the importance, politics and power of stories
A writer who wants to participate in a communal creative project
A newbie or oldbie who wants to have some writing fun
Anyone!
About the Writers' HQ Writing as Resistance Festival
Supported by Anglia Ruskin University and the University of Strathclyde
“A word after a word after a word is power” Margaret Atwood
Join Team WHQ, Anglia Ruskin University (ARU), and a carefully curated team of incredible authors for a month of panels, workshops, write-alongs and events exploring stories, writing and creativity as radical, political and powerful.
During September, we’re taking a deep dive into the rebellious, subversive nature of creativity and what that means for you, an individual writer sitting in front of a laptop wishing things were better, and for all of us, a community of humans existing together in a world where change often feels impossible.
We’re going to wade deep into the transformative possibilities of fiction and how stories can open portals, sow seeds of change, or lob a well-timed literary Molotov in the jaws of the machine. Fuck yeah!
But! The WHQ Writing as Resistance Festival isn’t just about talking, we’re also doing. With a series of free guided workshops, we are challenging all of you to write a brand new story, but one that’s unlike anything you’ve written before. And then we’ll end he month with a mass celebration during which we’ll send all our stories into the world at once.
The Mass Submission Project
Can stories change the world? Absolutely yes. Throughout the month, via a series of free workshops, we’re challenging you to write a story about climate justice that’s unlike anything you’ve written before. And at the end, we’re all going to submit those stories to the same five mainstream publications. Why are we doing this? Part protest, part art, part ritual outsporing of our collective desires and a demand to be heard. We don’t necessarily expect anything to be published (yet! Cooeee future anthology maybe?!), but we are out to make a noise. There is so much more that stories can do. So we’re going to do it.
Full details of the Writing As Resistance Festival can be found here >>