How do we take something lived, felt, remembered, or imagined and turn it into creative work? What do we choose to reveal, reshape, fictionalise, withhold, or leave unsaid?

Led by writer and theatre-maker Saraya Haddad, this 75-minute workshop explores writing from personal and lived experience while retaining agency over what we put on the page.

Inspired by Saraya’s own process of transforming lived experience of being spiked into the play SPIKED, the workshop will use discussion and practical writing exercises to explore how experiences, emotions, and ideas can be creatively transformed through different forms of writing.

Themes of agency, consent, control, boundaries, and creative ownership will run throughout, with particular attention paid to the choices writers can make about what they share, how closely a piece stays to lived experience, and what remains private.

Participants will be encouraged to experiment in whatever form feels right to them, be that poetry, playwriting, fiction, non-fiction, dialogue, or something in between!

The workshop is suitable for complete beginners as well as more experienced writers. Participants do not need to have experienced spiking, trauma, or any particular form of harm to take part. Writing can draw on lived experience, observation, imagination, emotion, or any other subject participants would like to explore.

Paper and pens will be available for anyone who needs them. Participants are also welcome to write or type using their own device if preferred.

This is a free event, but numbers are limited for the safety and comfort of all participants.