Helen Healy Writer & Reader in Mildura, Victoria | Arts and entertainment

Helen Healy Writer & Reader

Locality: Mildura, Victoria

Phone: +61 417 556 821

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23.01.2022 This picture (posted by David Brooks) resonates as I work on the fifth draft of my novel. I tend to over explain. Sometimes explain the same thing twice. I’m long winded with waste of space words and sentences. For instance if I came across this graffiti, I would not have simply written my name like clever Dave. I would have wasted words with something like oh yes there is and it’s Helen, putting a completely different slant on the gesture and it’s impact. As I ruthlessly... slash and burn my way through the fifth draft, (killing a few darlings in the process), it gives me untold pleasure to realise the beauty of less is more. The restraint of ‘Dave’ packs more punch, allows a collaboration between the writer and reader giving them a chance to fill in the gaps and to delight in its cleverness. This stripped down ethos of less is more allows my characters (and me) to act rather than analyse. It also tells my future readers that I trust them and have faith in their intelligence and imagination. Now as I edit I ask each word to justify its place.

19.01.2022 Tim Winton. Always nails it. Australia the place is constantly overshadowed by Australia the national idea, Australia the economic enterprise. https://placesjournal.org/article/the-island-seen-and-felt/

19.01.2022 Some useful reading, or punctuational distraction, as I edit and work on my fifth draft. https://www.theguardian.com//oxford-comma-helps-drivers-wi

18.01.2022 Poetry Read Out Loud, With Words, Series. #1 Orson Welles reads Walt Whitman's Song of Myself "A child said, What is the grass? fetching it to me with full... hands; How could I answer the child?. . . .I do not know what it is any more than he. I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven. Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord, A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropped, Bearing the owner’s name someway in the corners, that we may see and remark, and say Whose? Or I guess the grass is itself a child. . . .the produced babe of the vegetation. Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic, And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones, Growing among black folks as among white, Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I receive them the same. And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves. Tenderly will I use you curling grass, It may be you transpire from the breasts of young men, It may be if I had known them I would have loved them; It may be you are from old people and from women, and from offspring taken soon out of their mother’s laps, And here you are the mother’s laps. This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of old mothers, Darker than the colorless beards of old men, Dark to come from under the faint red roofs of mouths. O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues! And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for nothing. I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and women, And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken soon out of their laps. What do you think has become of the young and old men? What do you think has become of the women and children? They are alive and well somewhere; The smallest sprouts show there is really no death, And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it, And ceased the moment life appeared. All goes onward and outward. . . .and nothing collapses, And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUBtt--0hkY

18.01.2022 A call for writers to wield their pens in dark times. https://scroll.in//this-new-ghazal-by-javed-akhtar-is-a-cl

16.01.2022 Such a pleasure to host this session. I can’t recommend Ellen van Neerven’s work enough. Unpigeonholeable just weird and wonderful. An exciting Australian author who just won the MWF Tina Kane Emergent Writer award today.

15.01.2022 Aural pleasure.

13.01.2022 They say that ‘Paying attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.' If that is the case, then Helen Garner is one of the most generous people I know. On paying attention..... https://mwf.com.au/blog/read-all-about-it-helen-garner/

12.01.2022 Tell the whole truth. Don’t be lazy, don’t be afraid. Close the critic out when you are drafting something new. Take chances in the interest of clarity of emotion.

10.01.2022 "I am not wealthy except in where I live and calling my time my own This writer, her words, her presence and her novel, The Bone People, made a deep impression. I saw Kerri Hulme at the Harold Park Hotel In Glebe, in the early 90s, and she blew me away with her sense of self, her audacity and lack of pretension. Smoking a cigar, dressed like a bloke and after reading a few paragraphs of her 1985 Booker prize winning novel, threw it down saying ‘Fuck this, let’s talk.’ I will read Bait, but with no expectations, after 20 years since her last novel. https://i.stuff.co.nz//103196/keri-hulme-bait-expectations

10.01.2022 This is very encouraging!

10.01.2022 Great to see Queenslander Trent Daltons stunning debut, Boy Swallows Universe, on Oprah’s summer (Northern) reading list. Deserves all the accolades including feisty bids for film and series rights. Stylistically inspiring. https://www.oprahmag.com//books/g26765235/best-beach-reads/

10.01.2022 What about all the little stones, sitting alone in the moonlight? What about the grass? On aging and writing and noticing all things along the way by the incomparable Helen Garner.

09.01.2022 I’m delighted to read a piece against ‘show don’t tell’ as apparently I’m a bit of a teller and agree entirely that ‘In the real world, watching our action would be akin to constant dissociation.’ So here I am telling you to read on...

08.01.2022 After reading the first essay in this series, commissioned by Melbourne Writers Festival, I’m excited about those coming in the next few days. Sisonke Msimang’s essay offers heart warming/breaking insights into raising and protecting joyous children and reflections on paying attention in a painful world. Next up Helen Garner, Christos Tsiolkas and Ali Cobby Eckermann reflect on what has held their attention in their lives, their careers, and their writing.... Approached with nuance and clear-eyed critique, this series considers how the events of the last few months have shaped, altered, or shaken up the locus of our individual and collective attentions. https://mwf.com.au/mwf-digital-read-all-about-it/

08.01.2022 This imaginative growth without hope, without fear, without despair is the precious fruit of the inner life. A beautiful piece that resonates with me deeply. By keeping still, without distraction, I unexpectantly gain welcome Insights into myself and my writing. ... Have a read. It’s worth it. https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au//charlotte-wood-as-we-sho

08.01.2022 Brutal and brave and utterly compelling

08.01.2022 All that happens to us, including our humiliations, our misfortunes, our embarrassments, all is given to us as raw material, as clay, so that we may shape our art. I’m always inspired by Jorge Luis Borges and a few years ago spent time in Buenos Aires where I tracked him down. You can read about it here. http://helenhealy.com/tracking-down-borges

07.01.2022 Like a jazz musician improvising, or a surfer looking for a wave, or a bird riding a current of air, you’ll be rewarded by everything coming together. #gloriasteinem

03.01.2022 Tips for writing clearly and stylishly are welcome as I polish my book. https://www.theguardian.com//dreyers-english-by-benjamin-d

02.01.2022 The inimitable John Wolseley! Cant wait to see him at the festival. Register to experience this Australian legend. www.mildurawritersfestival.com

01.01.2022 A few must reads here