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Margaret Elphinstone - Author
Margaret is a successful author and is Professor of Writing at Strathclyde University. Margaret lives in Glasgow and was once a Brownie."Read and read and read. Read everything you can lay hands on."
If I was a girl, I think I'd pick the Norse period in Orkney or Shetland, as Viking women had a power of their own. But childbirth would still have been pretty bad. Or I'd live in Enlightenment Edinburgh - I couldn't go to University or have a profession if I was a girl, but I could still write novels - as several women did.
What an impossible question! Fair Isle has been a very important island to me, as I set a novel there, and have had many happy times staying at the Bird Observatory and with friends.
Uninhabited islands have their own sort of magic. I have stayed on Sule Skerry with a bird-ringing group, and that is a real outpost. Because it has no water supply it has never been inhabited.
North Rona is a wonderful island, and was inhabited for many centuries, not least by Saint Rona. It's very remote. I also love the Shiants, made famous by Adam Nicolson's book… And I lived for a while on Papa Stour, on the west side of Shetland, and wrote my first novel there. It was a very important episode in my life.
No, I can't answer your question! There are too many islands.
I am pleased with a novella I have just published called 'Gato'. It is written for adult emergent
readers - readers who have difficulty with the written word for various reasons.
The story was read by a panel of such readers who thought it would work. It was a challenge
to make the language, syntax and sentence structure accessible enough while keeping the story
complex and ambiguous.
The story has also been enjoyed by older school pupils and foreigners learning English. I'm
proud to have helped make reading more fun, and more accessible, for people who usually find
it difficult.
If one of your novels was to be made into a film - which one would you choose? Ideally, which actors would you want to play the main characters?
Read and read and read. Read everything you can lay hands on. Learn from the best examples you can find, and then try to do what they do - only do it your way. Do what good writers do, and don't bother about what anyone else says.
I remember one task was to remember a message in my head for more than ten minutes. I think
I could do that better when I was seven (nearly fifty years ago) than I can now, but it remains
a useful skill. I also learned to make a pot of tea and that has certainly helped me through
life.
I know how and where to pitch a tent and I can cook a decent meal on a camping stove. I don't
mind being out in all sorts of weather; I would have missed an awful lot if I'd stayed indoors
all the time.
Learning semaphore, which I found fascinating and kindled my interest in language and communication, which has been pivotal in the rest of my life.
Brown tunic, brown beret, and a leather belt. I liked the leather belt best. We had yellow triangular ties which we had to learn to tie. And a badge which had to be polished.
I read most of Jane Austen about once a year. I like her wit. I also like the Brontes very much. Contemporary writers - plenty, from Lionel Schriver to J.K. Rowling.
The women no one has ever heard of - the ordinary women who went on surviving, often under horrendous conditions. The only place you're likely to find their names is on tombstones. I am fascinated by tombstones in rural churchyards. That is where the untold stories are.
The map of where I am.
To find out more about Margaret please see her website
Go to main inspirational women page