Cape Town - In preparation for this year's Open Book Festival in September, Open Book Cape Town organised a series of workshops this week to improve writing skills and the literary landscape.
After a two year hiatus, Open Book Cape Town hosted the workshop as the festival returns to its live, in-person format this year with authors, publishers, and the general public participating in insightful and worthwhile conversations about the economy, the country, politics, and life in general.
Reimaging what a festival could look like to better fit the current scope of life, Open Book Festival program coordinator Frankie Murrey said they’ve decided to work on smaller engagements throughout the year, allowing multiple, but more flexible - opportunities to gather, speak and celebrate.
“We've always had a keen interest in skill sharing and exchange. By creating a series of workshops aimed at building writing skills, we hope to better equip people to tell their stories, and slowly but surely, we would hope to have a literary landscape with fewer missing narratives and voices. To us, an area we can support this process is through doing what we can to make getting the skills easily accessible.
“We were lucky enough to run a mini festival in March. To see the faces of people for the first time in two years was incredibly emotional. This has been the first time without masks, and that has been a pleasure. To see smiles. It's also been fantastic to have workshops running outside of the digital spaces. There's something about being able to learn amongst others that I don't think can be easily replaced.
“We've worked to reimagine what a festival can look like to better fit with the times we seem to be living through. We have made the decision to work on smaller engagements through the year, allowing multiple - but more flexible - opportunities to gather, speak and celebrate,” said Murrey.
With the Life Writing Collective running workshops for a number of years aiming to transform how one understands one’s own story, Dawn Garisch, one of the facilitators at the workshop, said that the sessions were important because they helped people to value their creativity as an inbuilt, free resource for learning how to manage their lives.
“Neuroscience suggests that our choices are driven by the story we tell ourselves, often not even realising that we are doing so. Uncovering the stories that propel our behaviour and learning how to creatively change that story so that it is helpful rather than harmful is essential for the well-being of individuals, communities and the natural world.
“The Life Righting Collective helps people to value their creativity as an inbuilt, free resource for learning how to manage their lives. Writing down those things that support us as well as those that have hurt us helps us come to terms with our experience, and promotes courage, confidence, better communication and resilience. Encountering others during the course helps us grow tolerance and compassion. The Life Righting Collective courses are essentially life skills courses.
“Regular creative practice is good for our mental health, which improves our physical health. It can cut across our assumptions and can counter prejudice by employing free association and meeting people who might seem different but have similar experiences, thereby promoting community cohesion,” said Garisch.
As this was only a warm-up for the main event, authors, and publishers are welcome to join the main event that will take place on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th of September 2022 at the Homecoming Centre (the former Fugard Theatre) in the Cape Town CBD.