Dear Reader
As an international magazine, we usually try to avoid ‘local coverage’ here at Writing Magazine’s Leeds office, so I hope you won’t mind what appears to be a Yorkshire takeover this month, spearheaded by our two leading ladies, Happy Valley screenwriter Sally Wainwright and Jane Eyre author Charlotte Brontë. For both writers, the evocative Yorkshire landscape features strongly in their writing, to the extent that it almost becomes another character. And, speaking as a Yorkshireman, so it should. But the lesson for writers anywhere is to be inspired by your surroundings whatever they are. Write what you know doesn’t just mean what you know about: there’s no better way to let a sense of place or character influence your writing than to use what’s in your bones. So whether it’s the concrete jungle or the salt-blasted coast, there’s inspiration outside your window that you probably take for granted. Don’t walk down the same street every day: open your eyes and see what’s different. Don’t plump for caricatures and stereotypes: you know the people around you better than that. See clearly, and you’ll write clearly.