Simon Smith reading some new poems.

Ben Hickman

Scarlett Thomas reading from upcoming novel.

This week, the Tuesday Creative Writing reading series hosted an open mic evening event to end the term. I’ve always thought open mic nights are terrifying, since you’re showing work to people who also write and who might be into something very different to you. It’s also hard to choose what you’re going to read if you write fiction, as the limit was around one or two A4 sides of writing. Of course, this is also a reason to get excited and learn other techniques and about other people and places and so on… But I still Googled around and found that the fear of being caught out as being unworthy of your occupation by your colleagues and friends is called ‘impostor syndrome’. And so we all had some wine first and no one spoke about our collective fear of public exposure (and some students had just been to a departmental lunch, which meant even more wine and even less fear) and so by the time the reading started, volunteering to read seemed like the best idea in the world.

Well, I still didn’t write my name down, but I was glad to have gone and listened to some awesome new work from both students and staff. I particularly enjoyed Simon Smith’s political poems and Ben Hickman’s poem, ‘The Monkey-Rope’. We also had the pleasure to get a preview of Scarlett Thomas’s upcoming work. The latter was filled with hilarious passages about potatoes (really, lots and lots of potatoes) and dieting and relationship problems. Scarlett started by telling us that it was a ‘work in progress’ (a statement which asserts the existence of the above-mentioned fear at all levels of experience) and so everyone felt more comfortable after that. Needless to say, I really can’t wait for her to finish it!

So here are a few photographs of the brave… Have a good Easter break everyone! I’ll be back with more weekly blog posts after the break (or with any Veg Box events during the holidays)! See you soon.