Writers Workshop by Morag MacTaggart

Writers Workshop 

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The inspirational Dunedin Writers and Readers Festival ran from 5 – 10 May. There were many fabulous events one of which was the Young Adult Writing Workshop with Mandy Hager. 

The workshop for teenagers (no adults allowed!) was designed to get great ideas flowing and to explore the craft of creative writing. A group of students from Logan Park High School attended the workshop on Friday 8th May. Mandy Hager was the Mansfield Fellow in Menton, France in 2014, and is the author of last year’s critically lauded Singing Home the Whale and the 2013 LIANZA award-winning Dear Vincent. 

The workshop was hugely informative and challenging. Mandy discussed the role of the Hero in writing and referenced John Campbell’s seminal work The Hero with a Thousand Faces. The resiliencies of character and the critical moments in a novel’s plot structure were also dealt with. The students found it very worthwhile with several commenting that “it made writing a novel seem possible.”   What more could you ask?