Writer of the Week

yep...seems so evie..... (link missing that is, not you being an idiot) also, a couple of the ex writers of the weeks interviews are inaccessible from the list.....

I Get bad links like I get in the wrong queue at the super market. It`s a disease or something.

I Get bad links like I get in the wrong queue at the super market. It`s a disease or something. Thanks for at least reassuring me that I`m not a fool Liana.

I Get bad links like I get in the wrong queue at the super market. It`s a disease or something. Thanks for at least reassuring me that I`m not a fool, Liana.

oopps. I think I`ll stop now.

Im new here and so I havent read too much yet but as you are writer of the week I decided to have a read of yours. Ive not read all of them yet but I have read your faves and any others that were mentioned in this thread. While many of them are a bit to deep for me (Im but a poor a lonely sun reader, with no ideas of my own that were fed to me by TV, Im only here so that my one brain cell doesnt feel lonely) I love your Zelda Fitzgerald, its one of the best Ive ever read (again, im not well read poetry wise but even so). It... erm... seriously kicks ass? Its... fab? Groovy? I dunno, Im not too good at this bit of e-mails but its really good. **End Ramble** (except for this bit) PS Ive not slept in a long long time so please forgive my inability to write coherently, I just let it all stream out and I dont believe in the delete button.

Not every writer of the week does the interview - but I did really want to read Mark's interview. If there is one, I want to see it !

Thanks very much `CMEast` for your comments, what you wrote flowed fine and was very encouraging. By deep it could be it was just incoherent!

I can assure evie that Mark.k - a member of my creative writing circle - fulfilled his obligations as abc Writer of the Week and posted an interview.

Some confusion - we are talking about this week's Mark - (YB) I did like Mark K's interview though.

Thre is indeed an interview. However, the features system which I upload new articles into has currently been hit by the UNIX equivalent of the millennium bug. This is being fixed. We'll be keeping Mark up as writer of the week for another week so that we can link through his interview (cos hopefully the bug will be nailed very shortly) In the meantime, here's the interview Cheers Em Mark Yelland Brown is a fine poet who was one of the original sub editors on ABCtales. Author of such pieces as Hampstead Poet, http://www.abctales.com/abcplex/viewStory.cgi?s=9531 A Passion Play http://www.abctales.com/abcplex/viewStory.cgi?s=8656 and Pink Ambassadors http://www.abctales.com/abcplex/viewStory.cgi?s=11333 Mark is based in London. He is currently doing a PGCE in English so he can teach in secondary schools. “It’s the best thing I’ve ever done”, he claims. “I love English Lit, and I really enjoy teaching. I think being opinionated, loving the sound of your own voice and having the emotions of a teenager, make good pre-requisites for teaching!” Mark, who is married with two small boys, has been writing from the age of nineteen (he is now 38). He joined the Highgate Poets where he spent two years, appearing in their anthologies, and was also published in Pennine Platform, a Northern Poetry publication. “For about ten years I concentrated on my song writing. I sing and play guitar, and in the last ten years have come back to poetry again”. Mark had his second kidney transplant, from his sister, last July and all is going well. “Illness has played a major part in my life, but not always negatively. I think it helped bring me to faith as a Christian, and made me a more compassionate person. I hope so, anyway. People ask me whether Christianity is just ‘a crutch’. I say ‘of course not. Jesus is my whole conveyance!’” How would you describe your writing? Sometimes inspired, sometimes unnecessarily wordy. Writing, for me, is a cathartic experience, especially my poetry. I unload my heart and try to dig out the truth. I adore poetry. It's about ‘seeing the skull beneath the skin’. My writing at it's best is inspired and has memorable lines in. At it's worst it can be didactic and uninspired. I think potentially I'm bloody good, but then I would! Which piece of writing are you most proud of? I think Be Safe, Hope, Lulu as Muse, Delight, Goldberg Variation and Emmanuel are particularly good ones. Maybe in another mood I might choose others. Usually, it's the one I'm working on that feels like ‘it’. Also, Refugees came close to what I was trying to achieve. Who are your favourite writers? Depending what mood I'm in : Robert Graves, Billy Shakespeare, T.S.Eliot, George Orwell, DH Lawrence, Milan Kundera, Dostoyevsky, Bulgakov and many, many more. What do you think of writing on the web? An excellent place for would-be writers to be read. Who are your favourite abctales writers? Fey Mouse, she's a smashing poet, moving, honest and descriptive. Poetjude is excellent. Of course my friend kimwest, who is an excellent writer and a smashing singer-songwriter. Eddie Gibbons is consistently great; willtate, robert and richardw. King Karl of the Wiggins is not just a good writer but a `pucker geezer` too. That weird person, Andrew Pack, I think he's rather good! Ralph and Stormy, whose stuff I like a lot and whose contribution to the threads are always honest and sometimes painful! And all those guys whom I regularly cherried, They know who they are! What is your advice for other writers? Don't have the omelette! No, seriously, keep writing, keep reading and only take criticism from people whose stuff you like. Find your voice. What are your aspirations? To lose weight and be the best English teacher I can be. Oh, and keep improving as a writer, finding my own voice. I am grateful to be able to write creatively. My song writing is also very important to me and in the summer I will be recording many of the songs I've written recently. As well as writing on my own I have a friend, Ben, who writes with me. A major friend and talent.

WEIRD ? WEIRD ? First Chant and now Mark. I am getting a complex (as opposed to being complex - those who know me will attest to the fact that I am very proud of being shallow).

*pondering the the meaning of the word 'painful'* :-) well done Mark

thankyou Mark :0)

Mark, you're a smashing poet too specially the ones which are like psalms, I love fay x

Can't believe you didn't put Zelda Fitzgerald in your list of your own favourites Mark - that's my favourite of yours (the Edgar Allen Poe second).

Thanks a lot for your kind comments, I'm really chuffed at being Writer of the week! It's great!

Andrew Pack, weird? I prefer offbeat or dry. Definitely one of those....

Weird was an affectionate term of abuse I assure you!