Finally, I could visit Stronsay, Barbara Fea's home island. A few months ago, I met some very kind folk from Stronsay who invited me to visit and to take a look at some of the locations in Barbara Fea’s story. If you’re here for the first
I've got a small display at the Sanday Heritage Centre that talks a little bit about the history of the island's dykes and shares a couple of the stories from my book. I was very pleased when they got in touch to say they'd
Nature Writing
I'm nearing the end of the Granta course on Nature Writing and I've given myself the challenge of writing a sequence of poems that connect to the Holms of Ire, the two tidal islands north of Burness on Sanday. Coincidentally, there's some problem with
poetry
After letters to politicians, porridge, I write poems. Send the exile cat photos and stories of sheep. We exchange gifs and then we toll the dead. Entire movements murdered and monsters martyred. I can feel the privilege of being able to look away To sleep and even wake without annihilation.
I've mentioned before that one of the greatest challenges I face with this book is that I'm approaching it without a background in history, so I'm having to figure out how to make sense of the vast array of documents in the archive rooms
I've had a pretty full-on week! From Monday until Wednesday, I was on a course that taught folk from Orkney's museums and heritage groups about how to manage, protect and care for the objects in their collection and then I spent Thursday in the archive,
Barbara Fea
Sometimes, research is thrilling. Mostly it's tedious. Sometimes, though, it chills your heart with horror.
1701
A letter from Patrick Traill to his brother, David, just before Patrick flees to escape the revelation of Barbara Fea's pregnancy at a very young age.
Barbara Fea
We know that neither history nor historians have been kind to women, but I needed proof.
Personal
I've started the Granta Nature Writing course, which is full of prompts and promise. The first week's task was to respond to a prompt which asked a series of questions that could be summed up as: Why do you write? The word limit was more of
After the excitement of starting the blog on Substack, my heart sank to read the ways in which the platform was monetising and profiting from cruel and dangerous content. Therefore, after some advice, I've moved across to Ghost.io. This is certainly a choice that's prioritises
News
This is Rag Stones: Stories from Sanday, a brand new site by Howard Hardiman that's just getting started. Things will be up and running here shortly, but you can subscribe in the meantime if you'd like to stay up to date and receive emails when new