York Literary Review: Emily Walker
Introducing Emily
From York, Emily has lived in quite a few places in The North, including Durham, Leeds and Wakefield. She returned to York to study her Creative Writing MA.
Who is your favourite author?
Elizabeth Bishop (technically a poet not an author).
What are you currently reading?
Currently reading a collection of short stories called Am I in The Right Place? by Ben Pester, it’s like The Twilight Zone in mundane, office environments, it’s great!
What are your top 5 books you’d recommend?
Boy Parts by Eliza Clark
Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo
The Ascent of Rum Doodle by W.E. Bowman
Nudibranch by Irenosen Okojie
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones
What do you do in your spare time?
Reading, writing and spending many hours playing The Elder Scrolls on the Xbox.
Where is your favourite place in York?
Vyner Street – it’s where my childhood home is and my parents have lived there since before I was born. It used to have a Blockbuster Video at the end of the road too, which I visited most Saturday nights growing up.
YSJ Questions:
Why did you choose to study at YSJ?
The Writing School has a great reputation, and the university has such a welcoming, supportive culture. On the open day, I chatted to Professor Abi Curtis who was so passionate and encouraging, she convinced me to apply.
How did the York Centre for Writing/ creative writing team help you develop your writing?
They have encouraged me to go out of my comfort zone. I have written in styles and genres that I would have been too scared to attempt before.
Did you enjoy the workshopping available during creative writing seminars and is this something you continue to try to do now?
Loved it! I have made such great friends from workshopping who I continue to share and read writing with, and luckily a large group of us are part-time students, so we will be continuing together for our final year.
What’s your favourite memory from your time studying with us?
Sounds incredibly generic but just getting to know the people on the course and reading their work – it is an incredibly talented cohort.
What’s your favourite course-based memory from your time studying with us?
From this year, I think it has been the workshop sessions we had with Dr Rob O’Connor in second term. It’s when I feel the group really bonded and everyone was so supportive of each other’s work. Because I study part-time, I can’t wait to carry on with workshops in my final year!
Where was your favourite place on campus?
With Covid, I didn’t get to see a huge amount of the campus, but I love the view out on to Lord Mayor’s Walk of the Bar Walls, particularly in Spring when the daffodils are out (how poetic!).
Writing Questions:
What sort of thing do you like to write? Please give as much or as little detail as you like.
I love writing about the strange in the everyday – whether that is setting sci-fi fiction in a sleepy, Yorkshire town, or exploring the weird places our minds go to in the most mundane of circumstances. I love writing about people, probably from how nosey I am and how much I love to people-watch. I like writing things that feel familiar despite its strangeness.
How did you find out about the York Literary Review and why did you submit work?
It was through my course tutor Dr Rob O’Connor who suggested we submit work. With the YLR being so closely affiliated to a university and city I love, I wanted to contribute something that could be part of that.
What did you submit, and did the team suggest any edits to it for the anthology?
I submitted a poem called An Elegy for a Box. It’s a poem based on a wooden box that belonged to my Nana and is heavily inspired by the work of Wendy Cope, whereby physical objects hold our intangible memories and feelings. And the team did suggest edits, which I am glad for, because their wisdom made it infinitely better! With poetry, changing just one word can improve a piece tenfold.
How did you feel when they said they were publishing your submission? Did you celebrate?
I did! I was incredibly flattered, particularly after learning how many submissions they received, I probably had some wine…
What do you think of the anthology itself?
The quality of writing is excellent, and the variation of pieces, whilst still being linked to the theme of Time and Memory, are so satisfying to read. Two of my favourites are Whalebones by Indee Watson and In the Shed by David Linklater.
Have you been published anywhere else?
Yes, I have had flash fiction appear in Ellipsis Zine, poetry in Sink Magazine and a short story appear in Beyond the Walls, another anthology arranged by York St John students and published with Valley Press. I have recently made the long-longlist for the Brick Lane Bookshop 2021 Short Story Prize too which was very unexpected, and am still waiting to hear the results of that, so fingers crossed!
Are there any publications you’d like to be published in?
Oh so many! I’d love to appear in an anthology arranged by 3 of Cups Press. Their 2020 publication Outsiders is one of my favourite anthologies in recent years.
What’s your writing process? For example, do you plot everything first, only write after a cup of coffee, write for 15 minutes a day, get frequent workshopping etc.
Unfortunately, I am a massive perfectionist. So I will research and plot and procrastinate for ages, write everything down in one go, and then edit meticulously. I love talking through my ideas beforehand, so I apologise to the many friends and family I have bored over the years with my story ideas.
Next steps:
Are you writing anything currently? If so, where do want the writing to ‘end up’?
I have a few pieces from my course that I want to develop, including the start to a dystopian novel set in a GP surgery in Wakefield. I do feel a bit of writer’s block after my course finishing for the summer though, so I usually take these as opportunities to read as much as I can for inspiration!
Do you work a ‘day job’ alongside your writing career? If so, what do you do and did your time at YSJ give you skills for the role?
I work full-time as a Support Assistant for Children’s Social Services – which is very different to my course! I would say my job involves communicating with a lot of people, and this past year has meant working from home, which has definitely inspired my stories that focus on the claustrophobia of being at home and craving for human contact.
What’s your writing dream? For example, to publish a novel or poetry collection, have your work adapted for TV etc.
I would love to publish a novel or short story collection. In terms of far-fetched dreams, I would love to write a book that someone could dissect and make a nerdy YouTube video about, something like ’50 Hidden References you might have missed in Emily Walker’s latest novel.’ I watch those kind of videos all the time!
What are your next steps? For example, submitting to competitions or magazines, writing a novel manuscript.
Finishing my final year of the Masters and hopefully going on to study a PhD (maybe even staying with YSJ!).
Do you have any writing advice you’d like to share
This is incredibly obvious, but read as much as you can, especially if you feel uninspired. This is the equivalent of your mum telling you to eat a piece of fruit when you’re hungry, but it really does make your writing infinitely better.
