workshop – Brevity

Q. In addition to a Brevity Hear Me Now workshop/talk at Ryde Library, you’re performing at this year’s Ventnor Fringe. Can you give us a preview? When and where can we catch your storytelling?

I am buzzing to be a part of the Fringe this year, it’s my first time. I’ll be performing a queered version of Gawain and the Green Knight and will put into practice a lot of what I’ll be talking about during the workshop. It’s still in the ‘work and progress’ phase but I’ve been having so much fun with it so far and can’t wait to do it on it 23rd and 24th of July at the V Fringe. Would be so lovely to see lots of friendly queer faces and allies there.

Q. How does your Scottish and Indian heritage inform and enliven your work?

At their core both cultures have deep and passionate storytelling traditions, so I feel very lucky I grew up with stories all around me, even though I wasn’t always aware of them. But also growing up mixed-race in a place like Dundee was often beautiful and tricky in equal measure. A lot of my work deals with the difficulty of belonging and feeling comfortable in your own skin and I think a lot of that is due to my heritage. Over the last few years I’ve really examined these things in my work so suppose in a way I owe some of the success of my work to this. More positively I always feel like I have such a depth of heritage to tap into, and there is always an interesting perspective when you are someone who straddles many worlds. Both cultures are warm, playful and centre community, I like to think this has massively impacted my work.

Q. You’ve written a beautiful children’s book entitled Rajiv’s Starry Feelings. How does writing for the page differ from writing for the stage? Or does it?

Oh a fun one. So I think it definitely does. Ultimately there are core things you always need to be authentic, but different mediums require different techniques to be as effective as possible. So on stage it is always important to remember that you are literally performing your work, no matter how small the stage, you’re on the stage...things like voice, gesture and pace can do so much of the work for you and in a way you need the words to do less. However, you also are limited because people can only hear you once, they can’t check back to see what you said 20 minutes ago, if they miss a key set up – that’s not great – so it’s on you to make sure important moments land. Whilst this is stressful there is also something lovely in the sense it’s in the moment, the audience are so important to something like storytelling and in a way each audience shapes the performance live, and if you get it wrong there’s always the next show.

“A lot of my work deals with the difficulty of belonging and feeling comfortable in your own skin …”

On the page you don’t have a live audience and I often find it a little scary how fixed it is, but there is also a joy and freedom in playing with the space that comes with the page. You can indulge in a little more detailed scene setting, you can choose to be a bit more opaque and subtle knowing that a reader can go back. And in a way it’s more intimate, you know it’s probably just going to be someone reading in their head so it’s as if you can just write to tell a story to one person.

I think this mindset of finding the positives in each medium is so important, what works on page may not work on stage and vice versa, a radio play will be different from a stage play, a visual animation may tell the exact same story but with no words. It’s all about learning tools and techniques to maximise the impact your story can have in the medium you are sharing it in.

Q. Whose work inspires you? Are there any writers of fiction that fire your imagination?

Oh so many, I always need to credit Ellen Kushner’s Thomas The Rhymer for being the book that made me become a storyteller. But Madeline Miller always makes me want to weep with jealousy and also just emotion with how good her work is, I think her retellings of the Greek myths are as good as it gets and are a serious lesson to anyone on how to make an old story new. In more nerdy ways the fantasy writer Michael Moorcock built my brain as a teenager and I’ve always been a massive Tolkien fan.

Q. Can you offer any advice to writers of flash fiction who are keen to write a folk tale but aren’t sure where to start?

I think folk tale and myth lend themselves so perfectly to flash fiction. Folk tales in particular are always essentially short stories in their purest forms. So if you aren’t sure where to start I’ll give the classic advice of read widely around folk tales, myths and legends (children’s books can actually be a great resource for getting into them). Then see which stories resonate with you, ask yourself why? Is it because Rapunzel’s hair strikes you as a metaphor for the male gaze? Does Goldilocks come to you as a horror story from the three bears perspective? Is Baba Yaga a misunderstood old school lesbian? And then write that version as a piece of flash fiction, you can follow the beats of the story that still work and change the ones that don’t to suit your new narrative and like magic you will have a pretty exciting and banging story.

Q. You recently referred to yourself as “deeply neuro-spicy” – a brilliant description by the way. Can you talk about how neurodiversity helps and/or hinders your creative process?

Firstly I know some people don’t like the term “neuro-spicy,” but I think it hits me so well. Like with my own brain I’m constantly going, “oooh, didn’t see that coming, there is a bit of heat in here.”

I’m a diagnosed dyslexic and am seeking a diagnosis for ADHD, I got my dyslexia diagnosis in my teens but my mum has always been very good at helping me understand that my brain worked a little differently. I read a lot of stuff around how both of these things are hindrances, and sure I struggle to focus on the project I’m meant to be doing, I can’t sit still for hours on end and am endlessly getting distracted by memes when I should be writing. The dyslexia was hard when I was younger. Getting your work taken seriously when it is riddled with errors isn’t easy, but I’ve worked hard to get a lot better at my spelling and grammar and also when you get to a published level you are working with a proof reader. However I think because I initially found writing so hard and limiting (despite loving it) the freedom of the stage and particularly unscripted storytelling was just incredible and I thrived in that space.

“…I know some people don’t like the term neuro-spicy, but I think it hits me so well.”

In terms of how my probable ADHD impacts me, I think I’ve learned to manage it so well these days that it’s an overwhelming positive. I’ve realised I work better when I’ve actually got 3-4 projects on the go at any one time and so my productively levels are actually generally far higher than my “neurotypical” colleagues. I also have vast amounts of energy to tap into, despite always feeling tired, I’m able to put in shifts of performances day-in-day-out in a way that others don’t seem to be. If I do have ADHD, I personally feel very lucky that I was raised to maximise my strengths rather than focusing in on my weaknesses. Creatively I think all different brains bring positive things, my dyslexia is certainly a hurdle when it comes to writing, but it’s not insurmountable and I broadly feel very lucky for my slightly strange brain.

Niall Moorjani is leading a FREE workshop/talk at Ryde Library on Sunday 21 July from 12.30 to 2.30. All LGBTQ+ people and allies are most welcome but you must reserve your place by dropping us a message here https://brevityisland.home.blog/contact/

Book tickets to Niall’s Ventnor Fringe performances on 23 & 24 July here: https://ventnorexchange.littleboxoffice.com/events/76365 https://ventnorexchange.littleboxoffice.com/events/76418

Q. You recently conceived and led a compelling series of outdoor, hands-on workshops for young people aged 16-25 on the West Wight. Tell us a little more about that project?
A. Yes, my partner and I drafted an Arts Council Project Grant last Summer and completed the workshop series over a 4 month residency over Autumn and Winter. For me, particularly in photography which is often gate-keeped with expensive equipment and overly technical
processes, it’s hugely important that the sessions I run are affordable and accessible to anyone. The series we conceived consolidated these ideas with the incredible source of local natural materials available in the west wight to create workshops that worked alongside nature and eco focused processes. These sessions included things like developing 35mm film with seaweed, or making natural dyes with the gorse flower found on the downs.

Perhaps even more relevant, particularly to the 16 – 25 age bracket we focused on, was creating sessions that allowed participants to work with their hands and on something new, whilst creating comfortable spaces to network and communicate. Though I’m not from the island, it was evident quite quickly that there is a lack of creative and social opportunities for young people on the Island (particularly in the West Wight), and for me it’s important to have exclusive spaces for certain demographics and communities. The issues different demographics face are often exclusive to that community, and so to create an environment where we can talk openly and relate to each other on those issues is hugely important.

Q. You’re a visual artist, a photographer – who are your influences, who moves you? Including possibly fiction writers who inform your creative practice.
A. Though I’m a photographer, it’s pretty rare that I’m hugely influenced by other photographers. There are photographers who I admire and respect, but they’re generally not the ones who influence my practice. If I look at the work that gets me excited to create it generally follows more performative pieces, written work (often analytical but sometimes
fiction), and music.

My themes change fairly regularly, at the moment I’m finding myself asking a lot of questions around masculinity within urban spaces, and the relationship between my own understanding of gender and sex with the physical infrastructure and buildings around me.

As I think through these ideas of emotional man made landscapes, particularly in London where I currently live, I’m drawing back to a range of creative influences. I find Burial’s music, particularly their album ‘untrue’, reflects a lot of my feelings and thoughts on the topic, as well as books like ‘Alone in Berlin’, ‘London Belongs to Me’, and ‘Last Exit to Brooklyn’, which all explore different personalities and stories in direct relation to the physical and political contexts they exist in. Their methods of written description are exactly what I look to
convey visually in my visual work; delicate and beautiful with heavier theoretical undertones.

Q. How do you imagine the Queer in Nature walk/talk might inspire the work of new and experienced Island writers?
A. Coming to a writing workshop from a photographic education, I hope my guided walk helps to give a new perspective on creative writing and our influences. Often I find myself stuck creatively, particularly when I’m trying to overthink or over engineer an idea, and generally the best solution to that is to give yourself an instruction or visual task completely separate from your natural way of working.

I hope the session helps to introduce a new way of thinking around descriptions and identities, and by the end of the session participants could have a new set of ‘building blocks’ of writing which can help us describe certain values and identities.

Q. You’ve talked about ‘finding infinite ways to describe and identify ourselves’ – give us a hint how examining and considering plant life makes that possible.
A. Particularly in queer identity, written language often fails us. There are literal examples of this in latin based languages, where everything is gendered and words for certain identities simply don’t exist yet; but also more complicated issues around strict labelling and language when trying to convey our very-much-fluid identities. By illustrating what we
relate to and identify as through abstract ideas and objects, like plants for example. I hope participants feel they can be as nonspecific and uncommitted to these ‘labels’ as they like, whilst still conveying the ideas of an identity.

Q. You’ve led a number of workshops and projects; do you have a top tip for fashioning creative spaces and projects that are safe, welcoming, inclusive and inspiring?
A. Primarily there are practical things I tend to do in all of the sessions I host and facilitate, as well as the queer party I work on. Making it clear that by attending the sessions you are agreeing to a respect and no-discrimination rule, by introducing my pronouns at the beginning and inviting others to do the same (again pushing that these are trans and NB
friendly spaces), and reiterating that if anyone needs to take a break or leave there is no pressure to stay; its generally important at a workshop to allocate a separate quite space away from the session as a break room, particularly when working with neurodivergent participants.

On a deeper level; I don’t run classes, I run workshops, I’m showing a process but certainly not telling anyone how to use that process. There is a natural power dynamic between the facilitator and the participants, and the workshops I see work the best tend to try to neutralise this power dynamic from the get go. Understanding that all the participants will be able to bring their own ideas and practises to the session, and holding those ideas as of equal importance to your own. By doing this we unlock beautiful sessions of skill sharing, experimentation and communication between the participants.

As part of the Hear Me Now project George Budden, a London-based photographer, will lead an inspirational walk entitled Queer Nature starting from The Red Lion pub in Freshwater on 25 May, 12.30 to 2.30pm. The walk is FREE of charge thanks to support from Arts Council England. Hear Me Now is a Brevity writing project, in partnership with StoneCrabs Theatre. To reserve your place on the walk, email caroline@stonecrabs.co.uk