Performing one of my poems - just a bit of fun really.... by Rosalie Warren

Coventry Writers' Group, the wonderfully supportive and excellent writing group to which I belong, has just, for the second year running, put on a performance of our work as part of the Coventry Literature Festival. We performed at the Criterion Theatre, Earlsdon, Coventry, who very kindly hosted us and even made some of our costumes. We read and acted out a variety of short stories, short plays, poems, factual articles and timely advice from Coventry City Council on how to deal with a zombie invasion. And that was just the start!

The photo below shows us in action at our dress rehearsal.

Photo by Derek Medcraft

My offering was a short and (I hope) humorous poem about the trials and tribulations of an aspiring writer who is rather premature in trying to sell her work. She is enthusiastic and slightly mad (so lots of acting needed there!) It has some slight relevance to what we Electric Authors are trying to do... so my apologies and please don't be offended, anyone. I am mainly laughing at myself!

Click here to see my performance on YouTube.

And do feel free to join in with the words below, should you be so moved!

Everything but the Book:

The tale of an aspiring Coventry author

Three publishers are interested: they’ve lined up in a queue;

Nine agents want to see my work: they loved my overview.

I've two pages up on Facebook – one for me, one for the book;

I’m blogging three times daily – oh won't you take a look?

My characters are tweeting like a noisy flock of wrens;

I have T-shirts for publicity, a mug and ninety pens.

They’ve my details printed on them – I'd a special photo done;

It’s costing me a fortune but I’m having so much fun!

I stand outside the Ricoh to accost the football fans;

I thrust pens and mugs and business cards into their sweaty hands.

I’ve given talks in libraries, in prisons and in schools;

I've done interviews in bookshops, by canals, in swimming pools ...

I’m up to date on income tax; I know my copyrights;

My cover blurb is perfect and the Booker’s in my sights.

I’m all signed up for PLR – or is it PLO?

I've a pen-name and a bank account – just let that money flow!

 

A guy responded to my blog – he said he’d tout my book;

I gave him thirteen hundred pounds – sadly, he was a crook.

But I’m soldiering on undaunted – I subscribe to Writing Mag;

I've read every book on ‘How to’ from Will Empson to Jo Bragg.

My head is full of P.O.V; I've joined the SoA;

I’m a regular at festivals, from Keswick down to Hay.

I’m up to scratch on all the latest market swings and trends;

I've met lots of famous authors – some of them are even ‘friends’!

My Writers’-n-Artists’ Yearbook is stained with coffee grounds,

With chocolate smears on publishers who’ve dared to turn me down.

My characters’ proclivities are typed up in a list

And I even know the toenail length of my protagonist.

My dialogue is flawless; I always stick to ‘said’;

My metaphors are never mixed, my ‘darlings’ killed stone dead.

I’m a master of the cliff-hanger, the turning point and hook ...

Now all I have to do is go and write the bloody book!

(c) Rosalie Warren 2013

 


Cheers to all
Rosalie

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