Ruth Railton is one of the recipients of the 2021-22 Malorie Blackman scholarship for ‘Unheard Voices’. We recently caught up with Ruth to find out more about her City Lit experiences, winning the scholarship, and future ambitions…
City Lit launched the Malorie Blackman ‘Unheard Voices’ Scholarships in 2019. The programme provides three annual awards worth up to £1000.
The awards seek to support and encourage the creative and professional development of ‘unheard voices’, and can be used to fund courses within the City Lit Creative Writing department. Due to the exceptional year we have had in light of Covid-19 and other world events, City Lit took the decision to offer one additional scholarship for 2021-22.
Last week we announced the four winners of the scholarship programme and we’ll be following their writing adventures this year.
Q: Can you tell us a little bit more about yourself and your writing background?
A: I began my career in magazine journalism more than 15 years ago and have always written and edited in some capacity for work. I have to confess though, I didn’t do a huge amount of it outside of the 9-5!
It wasn’t until I started going through a particularly difficult time in my personal life that I felt the urge to write for myself. I had all these thoughts and feelings whirring around in my head and I needed to channel them into something.
Poetry seemed like the ideal outlet as it was abstract enough for me not to feel too much pressure to make sense of my emotions if I wasn’t able to. I’d done a poetry workshop while studying English literature at university, which I have very fond memories of. And I also used to write love poems about a boy I was obsessed with at school, so the desire was obviously in me somewhere, desperate to get out!
Q: What role does writing play in your life, and why is it important to you?
A: Writing poetry has helped me to identify and process some of the grief and trauma that I’ve experienced over the past five years as my husband and I face an ongoing, daily battle with infertility, pregnancy loss and IVF.
It started out as a bit of a brain dump – somehow putting my thoughts on paper helped to alleviate some of their emotional weight. Then when we read our poems out in class, I got such an overwhelmingly encouraging response that I realised there was catharsis in having others hear my work too. So I decided to take it a step further. I had an anonymous TTC (trying to conceive) Instagram account, @gimme_a_BFP, which I wasn’t doing much with – suddenly, poetry gave it (and me) a purpose.
The Instagram TTC community was a safe space to rant and vent about the injustice and cruelty of infertility, without shame or fear of judgement. I was touched that my poems resonated with hundreds of other women (and a few men) who were going through equally gruelling and heart-breaking journeys, and I felt understood and supported.
I realised that poetry was a powerful tool – it was a neat way of crystalising my thoughts and packaging them up to share with others, somehow creating more impact than if I just typed out or said how I was feeling. But I also knew it would be more powerful if I shared it with people beyond the TTC community, who have no idea about how crushing infertility is and how it affects every aspect of your life. So during Infertility Awareness Week in April, I plucked up the courage to go public with my TTC account and share my poems with the wider world. I now have lots of people from my ‘normal’ account reading my poems and following our fertility journey. And it feels good to be heard and validated.
Q: Who are your favourite writers and what stories have inspired you?
A: My favourite book I’ve read in the last year is Tara Westover’s memoir Educated. It’s an incredibly inspiring story about how one woman battled all sorts of physical and emotional challenges to escape her strict upbringing and empower herself through education. I also love the raw emotion and honesty of everything that Sally Rooney writes.
But I have to give full credit to Raymond Antrobus for inspiring me to take up poetry. I randomly saw him perform some poems from his collection, The Perseverance, at a Tate Lates event a couple of years ago and I was absolutely blown away. Although Raymond writes about very different subjects – masculinity, dual heritage, the d/Deaf experience, dementia, to name a few – I felt completely connected to his explorations of identity, sense of loss and a determination to be heard. His delivery was so heartfelt and passionate, it moved me to tears. I bought his book, told him that he’d inspired me to start writing poetry and he signed it saying, ‘Welcome to the poetry club’, so I didn’t want to let him down!
Q: What made you decide to study at City Lit?
A: After seeing Raymond Antrobus perform, I knew I wanted to write poetry but I didn’t really know where to begin. Then, as if Facebook Messenger was reading my mind, an ad popped up in my inbox for creative writing courses at City Lit. I’m so glad it did! It was lockdown, so the timing was perfect as I had a bit more time and energy to channel into a course and the fact that it was online was actually really appealing – I don’t know if I would have been brave enough to bare my soul in a face-to-face class. I spent some time reading through the huge range of courses available and started to get excited for what lay ahead!
Q: What courses have you studied at City Lit?
A: I started out with the 11-week Ways into Poetry course. I really liked the way the syllabus was broken down into a different focus and poetic form each week. It was a lovely, supportive group and the tutor Julie Irigaray shared my love of modern poetry and always gave such inspiring examples for us to discuss. I enjoyed it so much that I signed up straight away for the 11-week Developing your Poetry course with Christina Dunhill, which has recently finished. This course had a slightly different format, which meant we got to hear and share poetry with a bigger group, which was great for getting constructive feedback.
Q: What made you decide to apply for the Malorie Blackman scholarship?
A: Initially, I wasn't sure that I was eligible as an ‘unheard voice’ – I’m a white, British, heterosexual woman, with no apparent disabilities, earning above the average wage and enjoying many privileges in life. But then I thought, why am I posting my poetry to an anonymous Instagram account in that case?
I asked my followers to vote on which poem they thought I should submit, and Piece by Piece came back as the resounding favourite, so I really felt like I had the whole TTC community behind me. There are some people who aren’t able to share what they’re going through with even their closest loved ones, leaving them completely isolated, so I thought maybe I could be a voice on their behalf.
I never in a million years thought I would be selected, but I thought just having the judges read my entry might help to raise awareness. But now, with the knowledge that Malorie Blackman picked my poem, I feel brave enough to share my writing with a broader audience and have my voice heard outside of the TTC community.
Q: What do you hope to achieve through the scholarship scheme?
A: I’m really looking forward to my meeting with City Lit’s writing coordinators to devise the ideal writing programme for me. I’d like to have my poems critiqued so I can improve them and develop a body of work, and see where I can take my writing next.
Q: Is there anything else you would like to share with us?
A: Thank you for giving me the tools to unlock my creativity and of course for choosing my poem – I am absolutely thrilled to have been awarded the scholarship (I was the surprise fourth entry to be picked, so it was a complete shock!) Infertility can leave you feeling utterly worthless and without purpose, so this was just the confidence boost I needed. I hope that by having Piece by Piece published in the Between the Lines anthology, it might help people experiencing fertility struggles to feel less alone as well as give others an insight into what they’re going through so they can better support them.
I also wanted to say congratulations to the other winners, I can’t wait to read their entries!
