M E L I S S A S T I R L I N G R E I D

I’ve been serious about writing since my early teens. It started with long emails to a family friend, and then a blog, and then journals: volumes and volumes of them, filled with (yes) the usual teenage angst, but also - tucked amid my swoonings and my slightly-contrived metaphors about round-abouts - I’d scribble down character sketches of people I came across, I’d try to language my observations about my daily life, I’d experiment with my writing ‘voice’.

For the last decade, I’ve been studying, teaching, ‘doing’ writing in an academic setting: in 2013, I graduated from Strathclyde University with a first-class honours degree in English Literature, Journalism & Creative Writing, and in June 2018 I graduated, again from Strathclyde, with a PhD in Creative Writing (even typing those words feels surreal). During those years, I focused mainly on fiction and I am currently coming to the end of writing a novel which I hope (one day) to publish. I’m interested, though, in how to use some of the techniques of fiction in telling true stories and I guess that’s where this blog comes in.

I’m taking some time away from academia to try and regroup, refocus – try and get back to why I want to write in the first place. While the PhD had many benefits, it has left me somewhat weary and I’ll admit that, though I’ve been calling myself ‘a writer’ on paper, I’ve recently been avoiding actually doing it. This website/blog/what-have-you is one way back in for me and also a reminder to myself to pay attention. To look closely at the 'ordinary’. To live with eyes wide open.

Thank you so much for reading and please don’t hesitate to get in touch if you’d like to know more, collaborate, hire me, or, y'know, just fancy saying hello!

ps. This is a re-housing of my previous blog, which you can still find: here. 

Unless otherwise stated, all the photographs and words on this site were are mine. Please do not use them without written permission.