Home: A Poem

I wrote this poem in light of the events in the news recently that have made the word ‘home’ a politically charged one, and also as a memory of my personal experiences that put into question what home might be.

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Literary Theory: Why Should a Young Writer Care?

Why should I be spending my summer holidays reading Terry Eagleton’s ‘Introduction to Literary Theory’? The unglamorous reason, of course, is to acclimatise myself to the looming rigours of studying English at university. Another reason is anxiety: count yourself lucky if you can sit in one place without your mind running wild. Mine, meanwhile, needs…

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An English Literature Workshop with Myself, Age 14

Humbling, funny and cringeworthy – that was my experience of writing this scene imagining myself as a mentor to a teenage version of myself. For all the earnest young writers and English students out there!

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Breathe In Dawn, Breathe Out Starlight: A Poem

Breathe in Dawn, Breathe out Starlight – some poetic observations on the endless intelligence and regeneration of the natural world around us.

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The Dress: A Fairytale…Or Is It? – A Short Story by Shreya Manna

In childhood, it’s possible for us to see, even believe, in the magic of fairytales. But as we grow older, there’s no reason why we can’t take our grown-up problems and laugh at them, thanks to the superpower that being human gives us: the power to tell stories. This fairytale is really a story I wrote for myself, to capture the circus of our minds that only we can hear.

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Waterfall (A Poem by Shreya Manna)

Sometimes I feel like a waterfall wrestling with gravity I am heavy and torrential and endlessly crashing against granite. Somehow I spill into the canals dug by words,  Slowing, a stream, rolling along soft clay. What I see is a stream of consciousness moving forward. What I see is the endless play of elements as…

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A Painter’s Tissue: A Poem

The blog hath risen from its slumber! As I have had some free time over the Spring Break, I managed to scribble down this poem. This is inspired by some of my recent reading: Shakespeare’s ‘Marriage of True Minds’ and Carol Ann Duffy’s ‘Valentine’. 

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