Reflections on London Lit Lab's origins
Guest post from co-creator Lily Dunn. On friends, teachers, mentors, inspirations...
Yesterday I was in London for the launch of a new book, The Bullet by Tom Lee. A memoir about mental illness and the history of the psychiatric hospital, in relation to his own family history. I was lucky to have been asked to read and offer a blurb to Tom’s book and have my quote on the cover, which is always a privilege. The launch party was at Daunts in Holland Park, which is where I had the launch party for my debut novel, many years ago. One of my editors for that novel was there - Laura Barber, and we tried to recall when we had last seen each other. Was my launch twenty years ago? Not quite. My first novel, Shadowing the Sun was published in 2007, by Portobello Books, an imprint of Granta.
I bumped into an old friend Julia Bell at the launch. Friend, teacher, mentor, inspiration - not sure what to call her. Someone who has had a lasting influence on my writing life and career. I first met Julia at the first Arvon course I ever attended, at Lumb Bank in Hebden Bridge, when I was in my 20s and wanting to leave my job at Time Out to dedicate more time to writing. Julia had very brightly coloured hair - it was either blue or pink, I can’t quite remember - and was teaching at University of East Anglia at the time; she was very sweet about my writing. Then we kept in contact via social media. I would attend the literary events she co-ran, In Yer Ear, in the upstairs of a pub in Fitzrovia, and later we had lunch together and I pitched an idea to her for a PhD. She was running the MA in Creative Writing at Birkbeck, University of London at the time.
One evening in a pub in Fitzrovia nearly ten years ago, I was with Julia Bell, and my buddy Zoe Gilbert, who I’d met at the notorious North London Writers (a quite critical and pleased with itself writing group) - when, over some chips, a pint and a couple of glasses of wine, Julia suggested that the two of us start up a writing school. We should teach day courses and evening courses, and work towards having other writers teach for us too. It seemed like a crazy idea - not something either of us had any experience doing, and what a jump, what a risk! - but we were both in need. I was on the brink of leaving my marriage, having to think about getting a proper job for the first time since having kids, and Zoe was looking at leaving her full time job to focus more on her writing. We were both up for doing something radical!
Zoe and I met at the Barbican Centre one afternoon and set up a website, and began to plan our first courses. We found a venue - my friend Leila owns a cafe and shop in Shoreditch and she said we could use it on the odd bank holiday if it was closed, and during the evenings. The first course we taught we barely made a penny, having spent any profit we might have made on feeding our students very expensive and very delicious almond cake from the cafe, and also giving away most of the places at discounted rates or for free. But we progressed. We had some very chilly teaching sessions in that cafe - there was no heating! – but people loved it and kept coming back for more, and we were given the opportunity to practice our teaching sessions.
We taught together at first, and really complimented each other with our different teaching styles. Zoe is the queen of playfulness and would scatter postcards across a table, or make use of objects we found around the cafe. As a memoirist, I have always been a bit more of a realist in my writing and my teaching. But together we were able to support each other, and to learn from each other, and also bring these two very different approaches to our students. We taught an intensive beginners course, and progressed to an intermediate course… and then we decided to try teaching our specialisms individually. Zoe taught a course on writing fiction inspired by folk tales, and I taught my first ever memoir course. During this stage we moved on to teaching at Birkbeck, University of London, where we were able to use a room because Julia, by this point, and taken me on as one of her PhD students.
It was during the pandemic that things changed. We had to cancel the live courses we had planned, but suddenly discovered a whole new reach online. Our little partnership really started to fly. Our courses booked up quickly and we were able to invite some of our writer friends to come and teach, too. We could now reach participants in other countries, or those who lived in places that were not within easy distance to London. We realised how London-centric we had been! The pandemic in the early days left so many people in shock, wanting to fill their time with something creative and nourishing, and our courses became their balm. Looking back at what is now hundreds of courses later, and thousands of hours of teaching, I realise WE MADE IT!
Now we offer a mix of live online workshops that happen over 2 hours or 2.5 hours, generally on a weekend, and longer Slack based courses - anything from writing for children, or enchantment in fiction, to how to write a memoir proposal. Over the years we have built up such a solid and supportive group of participants and they keep coming back for more - which must mean we are doing something right!
One of the brilliant things about running London Lit Lab is that it can run quite easily beside our other work - our writing, our other teaching, mentoring, any number of other obligations. Zoe and I have both written and published books - our most recent are Zoe’s Mischief Acts and my Sins of My Father – we’ve worked on and completed PhDs; we mentor lots of writers and are regularly asked to teach for other organisations. I teach as a university lecturer, too. But the great thing about running our own partnership is that we can be flexible and decide any one year how many courses we are going to run. I tend to teach three or four courses a year (they tend to be eight weeks long, some longer) - which fits in nicely with my other work. We have both become quite expert at running a portfolio career.
I was reflecting on some of this last night with Julia Bell and how important these relationships are. So, here is to friends, teachers, mentors, inspirations…
Please get in touch in the comments below if you remember LLL from the days we taught face to face. And also tell us if you have had any success with publishing a short story or essay after attending one of our courses. We’d love to hear from you…
A little bit of extra news
Just so you know… Zoe Gilbert is hosting a free short story discussion group here on Substack, and her next one is 6-7pm on the 21st of May, when the group will read and discuss, ‘The Rain Horse’ by Ted Hughes. All are welcome, as are all responses. The conversation will be informal, open, and will hopefully provide some new ways of thinking about story structure that you might apply to your own writing.
You can find ‘The Rain Horse’ online here.
Use this link to join the Zoom session on 21st May, 6pm: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83139641449?pwd=ZXlLZFJ5bWJDMWFZQ1V2S0IyRWRiQT09
The Zoom link is also included in our regularly-updated calendar on Substack.
Zoe is also running an online course that starts on the same day, 21st May: Saltwater Folk Tales is a chance to read and chat about lots of original folk tales of the shore and sea as well as contemporary fiction inspired by them, as a basis for finding your own way into folkloric retellings or original stories with salty inflections. You are welcome to join me, whether you’re just beginning to write or wanting to develop your writing and explore new directions (seawards!). The course is asynchronous, meaning there are no specific times you need to be online - so, no clash with Short Story Club if you would like to do both!
For all our other current courses please check our Calendar here