Travel Writing Workshop

I attended a travel writing workshop held at the Indian YMCA in central London last Saturday. The workshop was an all day affair organised and carried out by Peter Carty, a successful journalist and editor. Peter has almost twenty years of experience in the sphere of journalism. He contributes to many well-known publications, including The Guardian, The Independent and Conde Nast Traveller.

I have very little experience in travel writing. I entered The Guardian travel writing competition in December 2011. A friend sent me a link to the competition, and as a keen writer who had recently returned from a four month trip to India, Borneo and South East Asia, I figured why not give it a go? I didn't get anywhere with it, but I enjoyed writing the piece about the Keralan Backwaters in South India (posted previously).  When I saw this workshop advertised I thought it would be a good thing to do before quitting my job and heading off to South America...If I can write an article or two out of it, I'm all for that!

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The workshop cost £115, and I felt that it was worth it. Peter shared his wealth of knowledge willingly, and set us tasks to hone in on and practice our travel writing. Following the workshop we all received an extensive set of notes. Peter also informed us that we could e-mail him drafts of potential travel features for an unlimited period of time and he would provide feedback. This was an appealing bonus.

Looking over my competition entry after the workshop, I spotted many errors that I didn't pick up on before. As Peter explained to us, travel writing is a craft. You don't have to be a literary genius to do it successfully, you just need to know how to market a piece towards a particular publication and tick the boxes that come with the form. Above all, the feature must be captivating to read.

Much of the work in creating a travel piece should actually be done before the writing commences. It is important to scope out the publication you intend to pitch your piece to, as well as research the destination and perhaps come up with an angle for your piece before visiting/ whilst at your destination.

Peter gave us many technical and stylistic pointers to aid our writing and in the afternoon we learned how to pitch our features to a commissioning editor, what travel publications we should submit to, and rates of payment.

All in all I came away from the workshop well informed and excited at the prospect of getting a travel feature published (fingers crossed). Excitement aside, I also felt that Peter gave us a realistic view into the world we were dipping a toe into. When we read out our ideas/ short pieces during exercises Peter set us, he often said 'not sure about that' or 'ok, that's fine', without sounding overly enthusiastic about too many of them. Realistically, in writing, this is how it is. There are so many wannabe writer's out there, that average ain't gonna cut it. This is a craft that needs to be practiced, revised and agonised over a little if you want to be any good.

The satisfaction when a piece is finished should be the motivation to keep you working through it.

For further info please visit the website for Peter Carty's travel writing workshop here: http://www.travelwritingworkshop.co.uk/