THE WI MEMOIR PROGRAMME
The Contemporary Women Writers’ Club
WI National Memoir Writing Project
"What three moments in your life would you like to document for your children or loved ones - or even for yourself?"
We are delighted to announce the launch of an exciting new memoir writing programme devised specially for WI members by The Contemporary Women Writers’ Club (CWWC). The CWWC team will help you focus your memories through an easy-to-follow modular course. Their expertise will enable local WI groups to think about, plan, structure, write and finally, edit and publish your own memories as part of a series of beautiful, printed collections. Whether you wish to recall memories of the Blitz or travels in India, early childhood or home birth, secretive teenage romances or loves lost or won in later life, this course with help you write down and share your very own heart-moving tales.
Register now and make it your new year’s resolution to take part!
Launching in the autumn, the programme proper commences in January 2011. You will need register with other interested members of your local WI by December 2010 to take part. By October 2011 your stories will be collated and published as part of a series of invaluable WI collections and you will receive 10 copies of your own beautifully-designed book each.
Register initial interest now at www.Queenbee.co.uk.
How the programme works:
You will set up your own local WI writing group and together follow the eight-session programme over the course of 16 weeks. Each group will receive an invitation to an induction day, a starter pack for your elected ‘group leader’ and all the course materials will be available online and as downloadable printouts. The material is exclusive to WI members and accessible initially through the Moodle, thus making sure it is ONLY WI members who can join this programme. Within WI groups, individuals who subscribe to the programme will receive a unique online login enabling them to access the www.CWWC.com website, within which will reside the unique WI Memoir site. We are hoping that this programme run annually.
The “sessions” will provide a framework for writing memoir: they will give advice on structure and language and provide writing exercises. They will also inspire with tips and advice from leading literary figures such as Lynn Barber, Tracy Chevalier, Jenni Murray and Lucy Cavendish.
Every branch taking part in the programme should have a Group Leader who, ideally, has their own computer or has easy access to a computer so they can download course notes for those members who do not have access to a computer. The course is designed to be collaborative. The chosen group leader will be at the centre of this process by encouraging members to take the course, follow the modules, discuss their progress, maybe even get together more often than at group writing meetings, to offer each other support and watch the additional visual content that will be available through the memoir-writing programme.
By the end of the programme each individual should have written a memoir of approximately 1750 words. Each group (with an ideal membership of 8 to 10 although we can accommodate groups of various sizes) will have produced a collection of memoirs suitable for publication as a slim book. The CWWC will then produce the books through Queenbee Press, its own indepdendent women’s imprint, for WIs across the nation, creating a unique library of women’s lives.
The Programme:
There are eight main modules
• Memoir – memory and imagination. The difference between memoir/autobiography
• Picking a theme – eg. childhood, education, home, work, friendship, environment
• Structure – beginnings, middles and ends
• Style – emotion and audience
• Limitations, liberations and language –eg. wordcount, prompts and linguistic tricks
• Character –autobiographical challenges – fact v fiction
• Editing – constructive criticism
• Collating a collection
Timing for 2011 Collections
Launch and registration - Sept -Dec 2010
Programme runtime - Jan-June 2011
Collation of collections - July-Sept 2011
Delivery of printed books to local groups - Oct 2011
Welsh members can write their memoirs in Welsh.
For deaf members, we can provide written transcripts of the visual content.
Costs to individual WI members
The course will cost £60 per member for the 8 sessions and includes 10 printed books each at the end of the course.
This will include:
• Starter Pack for the Group Leader
• A unique ID and password to the WI/CWWC Memoir Website containing advice, hints & tips, online exercises and forums relating to the programme modules – also accessible through the Moodle
• 8 downloadable programme modules
• 10 copies of the completed memoir per member. These will have a rrp of £5. If local WIs want to sell the books, you can recoup most of the cost of the course, and/or use this as a fundraising opportunity. Further copies of the book will be available for purchase at a reduced price. In addition, each book will have its own unique ISBN number and be available online through all the key recognised book buying sites, including Amazon.co.uk.
• Free membership to The Contemporary Women Writers' Club and a 10% discount on other courses on the site, including writing fiction, short stories and how to get published.
Invitation to induction days for the WI Memoir Writing Programme
Offers of supporting services such as editing and proofing.
Background
There’s a big buzz in the press about The Contemporary Women Writers’ Club. It is the ultimate online writing community for all women with a passion for writing and is widely supported by many eminent women writing today. When it launches this autmn www.cwwc.com aims to encourage all women to share in their writing and to publish their work, both online and in print. The site provides creative writing programmes by expert women writers of fiction and non-fiction as well as services, forums for debate, online stories, a readers’ corner, interviews with established women writers, agents and publishers, workshops and webinars, talks and festival offers. It is an invaluable online resource on getting published in print and digital forms and guides you to the best associated services. The site also offers insider information on latest developments in the publishing industry. The site will include film and sound content as well as digitally downloadable stories. It is a home for learning, collaborating, sharing and celebrating the art of women writing today.
Queenbee Press is the imprint of the CWWC. It intends to harness the potential of the CWWC community by publishing new writing by talented women writers, both in book print form and digitally on cross-platform applications, such as the web, and on mobile technology, including the iPhone.
All founder members of The Contemporary Women Writers' Club are established writers in their field. They are eminent Penguin novelists Lucy Cavendish and 3-time Random House novelist Miranda Glover, journalist Rachel Jackson and former BBC producerJennie Walmsley. The Leap Year, their first collection of short stories was published with Queenbee Press in November 2009, to critical acclaim. Their much-awaited second collection, Ten Past Eight, will publish on October 20, 2010.
For more information and to register your interest in theWI Memoir Programme please go to register your interest now . Don’t forget to inform us of your local WI group. When you register formally for the course this autumn, it will need to be as a local group.
WI National Memoir Writing Project
"What three moments in your life would you like to document for your children or loved ones - or even for yourself?"
We are delighted to announce the launch of an exciting new memoir writing programme devised specially for WI members by The Contemporary Women Writers’ Club (CWWC). The CWWC team will help you focus your memories through an easy-to-follow modular course. Their expertise will enable local WI groups to think about, plan, structure, write and finally, edit and publish your own memories as part of a series of beautiful, printed collections. Whether you wish to recall memories of the Blitz or travels in India, early childhood or home birth, secretive teenage romances or loves lost or won in later life, this course with help you write down and share your very own heart-moving tales.
Register now and make it your new year’s resolution to take part!
Launching in the autumn, the programme proper commences in January 2011. You will need register with other interested members of your local WI by December 2010 to take part. By October 2011 your stories will be collated and published as part of a series of invaluable WI collections and you will receive 10 copies of your own beautifully-designed book each.
Register initial interest now at www.Queenbee.co.uk.
How the programme works:
You will set up your own local WI writing group and together follow the eight-session programme over the course of 16 weeks. Each group will receive an invitation to an induction day, a starter pack for your elected ‘group leader’ and all the course materials will be available online and as downloadable printouts. The material is exclusive to WI members and accessible initially through the Moodle, thus making sure it is ONLY WI members who can join this programme. Within WI groups, individuals who subscribe to the programme will receive a unique online login enabling them to access the www.CWWC.com website, within which will reside the unique WI Memoir site. We are hoping that this programme run annually.
The “sessions” will provide a framework for writing memoir: they will give advice on structure and language and provide writing exercises. They will also inspire with tips and advice from leading literary figures such as Lynn Barber, Tracy Chevalier, Jenni Murray and Lucy Cavendish.
Every branch taking part in the programme should have a Group Leader who, ideally, has their own computer or has easy access to a computer so they can download course notes for those members who do not have access to a computer. The course is designed to be collaborative. The chosen group leader will be at the centre of this process by encouraging members to take the course, follow the modules, discuss their progress, maybe even get together more often than at group writing meetings, to offer each other support and watch the additional visual content that will be available through the memoir-writing programme.
By the end of the programme each individual should have written a memoir of approximately 1750 words. Each group (with an ideal membership of 8 to 10 although we can accommodate groups of various sizes) will have produced a collection of memoirs suitable for publication as a slim book. The CWWC will then produce the books through Queenbee Press, its own indepdendent women’s imprint, for WIs across the nation, creating a unique library of women’s lives.
The Programme:
There are eight main modules
• Memoir – memory and imagination. The difference between memoir/autobiography
• Picking a theme – eg. childhood, education, home, work, friendship, environment
• Structure – beginnings, middles and ends
• Style – emotion and audience
• Limitations, liberations and language –eg. wordcount, prompts and linguistic tricks
• Character –autobiographical challenges – fact v fiction
• Editing – constructive criticism
• Collating a collection
Timing for 2011 Collections
Launch and registration - Sept -Dec 2010
Programme runtime - Jan-June 2011
Collation of collections - July-Sept 2011
Delivery of printed books to local groups - Oct 2011
Welsh members can write their memoirs in Welsh.
For deaf members, we can provide written transcripts of the visual content.
Costs to individual WI members
The course will cost £60 per member for the 8 sessions and includes 10 printed books each at the end of the course.
This will include:
• Starter Pack for the Group Leader
• A unique ID and password to the WI/CWWC Memoir Website containing advice, hints & tips, online exercises and forums relating to the programme modules – also accessible through the Moodle
• 8 downloadable programme modules
• 10 copies of the completed memoir per member. These will have a rrp of £5. If local WIs want to sell the books, you can recoup most of the cost of the course, and/or use this as a fundraising opportunity. Further copies of the book will be available for purchase at a reduced price. In addition, each book will have its own unique ISBN number and be available online through all the key recognised book buying sites, including Amazon.co.uk.
• Free membership to The Contemporary Women Writers' Club and a 10% discount on other courses on the site, including writing fiction, short stories and how to get published.
Invitation to induction days for the WI Memoir Writing Programme
Offers of supporting services such as editing and proofing.
Background
There’s a big buzz in the press about The Contemporary Women Writers’ Club. It is the ultimate online writing community for all women with a passion for writing and is widely supported by many eminent women writing today. When it launches this autmn www.cwwc.com aims to encourage all women to share in their writing and to publish their work, both online and in print. The site provides creative writing programmes by expert women writers of fiction and non-fiction as well as services, forums for debate, online stories, a readers’ corner, interviews with established women writers, agents and publishers, workshops and webinars, talks and festival offers. It is an invaluable online resource on getting published in print and digital forms and guides you to the best associated services. The site also offers insider information on latest developments in the publishing industry. The site will include film and sound content as well as digitally downloadable stories. It is a home for learning, collaborating, sharing and celebrating the art of women writing today.
Queenbee Press is the imprint of the CWWC. It intends to harness the potential of the CWWC community by publishing new writing by talented women writers, both in book print form and digitally on cross-platform applications, such as the web, and on mobile technology, including the iPhone.
All founder members of The Contemporary Women Writers' Club are established writers in their field. They are eminent Penguin novelists Lucy Cavendish and 3-time Random House novelist Miranda Glover, journalist Rachel Jackson and former BBC producerJennie Walmsley. The Leap Year, their first collection of short stories was published with Queenbee Press in November 2009, to critical acclaim. Their much-awaited second collection, Ten Past Eight, will publish on October 20, 2010.
For more information and to register your interest in theWI Memoir Programme please go to register your interest now . Don’t forget to inform us of your local WI group. When you register formally for the course this autumn, it will need to be as a local group.