Book Review
Creative Writing for Beginners
by Colin Batrouney
by Emily Laidlaw, May 2013
With creative writing workshops and degrees attracting more students than ever, there’s been a lot of discussion about whether writing can be taught, but much less about why so many of us are drawn to enrol in the first place. Colin Batrouney’s second novel, Creative Writing For Beginners, may hold part of the answer.
Joel, a disaffected twentysomething, glibly enrols in a course in order to fulfil a requirement of his unemployment benefits. It is there that he meets fellow misfit Phillip, who, unlike Joel, shows little interest in others’ writing, yet harbours grandiose notions about his own output. Despite their differences, they find solace in each other’s painful back-stories.
Joel’s tale is interwoven with that of his flatmate Nomee, a talented but troubled actress. Having scored the role of Nina in an upscale production of Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull, Nomee soon discovers parallels with her lonely and unfulfilled character. As her director notes, Chekhov’s play resonates because it teaches us ‘to accommodate failure – to live with our limitations’.
Failure, of course, is an unavoidable fact of both the writing and acting worlds, and perhaps herein lies the answer to the opening question. While the arts rarely provide security in the way of fame and fortune, what they do provide is consolation from the everyday and the hope to continue on – something Batrouney’s characters yearn for.
The narrative itself is rather Chekhovian – it deliberately ambles and focuses on the mundane. Batrouney’s prose, meanwhile, is highly lyrical and demands a slowed pace to fully appreciate. It’s full of those flickering moments of inspiration that hit us all, but which only a gifted few can crystalise into prose. Batrouney is one of those enviable few.
Emily Laidlaw is a freelance writer.
