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<\/a>Ellora Sutton<\/p><\/div>\n
Can you tell me about yourself and your writing? When did you first start? Do you focus on writing poetry, or do you write in other genres?<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n I live in the small village of Kingsley, in Hampshire, with my grandparents and aunt. I graduated with a First Class BA (Hons) in Journalism and Creative Writing from the University for the Creative Arts back in 2018, and I work in the heritage sector although I like to call myself a poet. My debut chapbook, All the Shades of Grief<\/em>, was published last September by Nightingale & Sparrow, I\u2019ve been published by Poetry News<\/em>, Poetry Birmingham Literary Journal<\/em>, and fourteen poems<\/em>, amongst others. I\u2019ve won the Mslexia<\/em> Poetry Competition, the Poetry Society and Artlyst\u2019s Art to Poetry Award, and I\u2019m the first person to have won the Pre-Raphaelite Society Poetry Competition two years in a row. My main themes include art, feminism, mental health, and mythology.<\/span><\/p>\n I\u2019ve always written. Some of my earliest memories are of dictating little stories to my mother for her to write down for me, before I knew how to properly hold a pen. I really got into poetry when I studied Carol Ann Duffy\u2019s The World\u2019s Wife<\/em><\/a> at A-level, it was an absolute awakening for me. It was the first time I really experienced poetry rather than just reading it. My mother died when I was fifteen, and poetry was a vital outlet for me in terms of processing that grief \u2013 it still is. I focus my writing on poetry, I don\u2019t have the patience for anything else! I love poetry because it really is an \u2018anything goes\u2019 kind of genre. There is total freedom in terms of form, subject, theme. I love the possibilities, the chances for surrealism. Poetry is the oldest kind of writing, but it in many ways feels (to me at least) like the most modern.<\/span><\/p>\n What stage are you at with the Creative Writing MA? Assuming poetry is your first genre, what is your secondary genre? Do the two genres inform each other, and in what way?<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n I am in my second year, and I\u2019ve just started planning my big end-of-module project, I\u2019m hoping to do something with trauma and Medusa<\/a>. Yes, poetry is my first genre. My secondary genre, for both years, has been creative nonfiction, which has been utterly illuminating. I\u2019d never tried creative nonfiction before, but it strikes me as quite a natural bedfellow to poetry. I\u2019ve come to view poetry as a type of creative nonfiction, in that it often deals with the personal lived experience of the writer in creative ways. It\u2019s been incredibly helpful as well in terms of research, a skill that I\u2019ve carried over into my poetry.<\/span><\/p>\n How has the MA helped with your writing?<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n I live in quite a rural area, and I don\u2019t drive, so it\u2019s been wonderful to have such a thriving community of fellow writers and students to share my work with. It\u2019s been very helpful, getting honest, constructive feedback on early drafts \u2013 it\u2019s also been helpful to do the same for others, it\u2019s sharpened my understanding of craft greatly. The MA has really pushed me to explore forms and themes I wouldn\u2019t have otherwise thought myself capable of. For example, prose poetry had always felt beyond me. But we studied it in the second year, and it was set as an activity \u2013 the poem I first drafted for that activity, \u2018A postcard on the restorative effects of sea air after a nervous breakdown\u2019, recently won the Mslexia<\/a> Poetry\u00a0<\/span>Competition. Prose poems have since become a bit of an obsession. Perhaps most importantly though, the MA has massively boosted my confidence in my writing.<\/span><\/p>\n What do you like to read? Has the MA made a difference to this? Who are your favourite poets\/authors? Is there a writer you have discovered recently who you would recommend?<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n I have quite an eclectic taste. My big obsession is and forever will be Jane Austen<\/a> \u2013 I am just coming to the end of my tenure as poet-in-residence at Jane Austen\u2019s House. I do mostly read contemporary poetry, though, in the form of collections, pamphlets, magazines and journals. The MA has definitely widened my reading \u2013 studying creative nonfiction has ignited a love in me of biography, memoir, history, art history. It\u2019s also made critical and craft writing feel much more accessible. Writing Poems<\/em> by Peter Sansom has become my absolute bible, and I first met it through the MA.<\/span><\/p>\n My favourite poets include: Liz Berry, Carol Ann Duffy, Sylvia Plath, John Keats, Andrew McMillan, Ella Frears, Ella Duffy, Nina Mingya Powles, Phoebe Stuckes, Caroline Bird, Chen Chen, Ocean Vuong, Pascale Petit, Hannah Hodgson, Rachel Long, Natalie Diaz, Danez Smith, Natalie Linh Bolderston, Malika Booker \u2013 this is a very abridged list! I recently read Life Without Air<\/em> by Daisy Lafarge, which absolutely blew my mind. And I\u2019ve got to mention specifically Malika Booker\u2019s Pepper Seed<\/em>, another recent read of mine, the kind of book that stuns you as a reader and inspires you as a writer. My most prized possession is my signed copy of Carol Ann Duffy\u2019s Collected Poems<\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n Where do you go from here? What would you like to achieve with your writing?<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n I\u2019m currently working on a manuscript of poems looking at women\u2019s mental health through the lens of my personal family history, which has been a very exploratory and freeing experience. I would love to find a publisher for that \u2013 that\u2019s really my next big goal, a first collection. And completing my MA, of course!\u00a0After that, I\u2019d love to have a go at a PhD in poetry.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" OU Creative Writing MA student Ellora Sutton, winner of the 2020 Mslexia Poetry competition, talks to\u00a0Sally O’Reilly, Senior Lecturer, Creative Writing. Can you tell me about yourself and your writing? When did you first start? Do you focus on writing … Continue reading