Upcoming Workshops

• Tuesday 4 August 2026
  Workshop Meeting
  Venue: Zoom (link to be announced via email).
  Visitors $10.
   

  Trigger ... in the dead of night ... Workshop Detective work and archaeology: using personal photographs as prompts for writing memoir. IWW is delighted to welcome Margaret Moores as presenter for this Workshop in the lead-up to the next IWW writing competition, which will be for a short (750 word) creative snapshot/memoir written in the first-person point of view and prompted by a photograph. To prepare for this workshop, please find a photograph or photographs of yourself as a child. Anything from a candid shot to a school photograph or a posed commercial keepsake will be suitable. Telling stories about our past is a way for us to construct a sense of our personal identities. Photographs, especially the kind that fill family photograph albums or boxes of keepsakes, are often seen as objects to help us remember occasions, incidents and people from the past. Photographs can be valuable tools for people embarking upon memoir writing because memoir, as distinct from an autobiography that is the chronological story of the narrator’s life, is often composed of a series of snapshots from that life. This workshop will encourage you to view photographs not just as memory prompts, but as clues to help you reconstruct past events in your life from fragments of evidence captured in a photograph. Social historian Annette Kuhn suggests that working with photographs in this way is a bit like detective work or archaeology. You have to work backwards – ‘searching for clues, deciphering signs and traces, making deductions [and] patching together reconstructions out of fragments of evidence.’ Margaret will explain how she used a photograph of herself as a schoolgirl as a prompt for imaginative memoir while she was completing a PhD in Creative Writing. During the workshop, you will have the opportunity to begin your own detective work with your selected image(s) and to share your initial deductions. Competition Due A Single Poem – up to 40 lines, to be judged by Gail Ingram. Check out her bio on her website theseventhletter.nz What Gail looks for in a poem Originality of language – surprising word choices, images and sounds Insight – that moment in the writing where the view of the writer/reader shifts and we gasp; we discover something about the the world and ourselves Fine crafting – that movement across a line or stanza, the subtle play of the poem's shape, deliberate repetition not accidental, form enhancing content What Gail would rather not see in a poem the flip side of above points – not original (cliched, same old language) doesn't have movement towards discovery, merely descriptive the form, shape, language of the poem doesn't really capture or enhance what the poet is trying to say An email with submission instructions will be sent to all 2026 IWW members. Submissions will open on Wednesday 29 July and close at 5pm on Tuesday 4 August. The Monthly Competition Rules apply.

• Tuesday 18 August 2026
  Workshop Meeting
  Venue: Lindisfarne Room, St Aidans.
   

  Trigger ... bolt ... Workshop Results of the Single Poem – up to 40 lines judged by Gail Ingram followed by readings of the poems from those who entered and are at the workshop. Entrants, please ensure you have a copy of your poem with you to read. Members Share segment A member-hosted writing prompt or activity.

• Tuesday 1 September 2026
  Annual General Meeting and Workshop
  Venue: Zoom (link to be announced).
  
    Annual General Meeting – starting at 10.30am sharp.
  
  Matters to be dealt with include:
  • Minutes of the 2025 Annual General Meeting
  • Presentation of Annual Reports and accounts for 2025-2026
  • Election of officers
  • The setting of the annual subscription
  • Other business that was sent to the secretary as a remit (in writing) by 11 August 2026
  Click here for access to the AGM forms.
  
  This will be followed by readings of today's trigger and a short workshop.
  
  

  Trigger ... under construction ... Workshop Following the AGM, if time, there will be a member-hosted activity or writing prompt. Competition Due Memory Story – a personal memory written in first person point of view, up to 750 words, to be judged by Margaret Moores. This competition is open to paid up IWW members only. An email with submission instructions will be sent to all 2026 IWW members. Submissions open on Wednesday 26 August and close at 5pm on Tuesday 1 September. The Monthly Competition Rules apply.

• Tuesday 15 September 2026
  Workshop Meeting
  Venue: Lindisfarne Room, St Aidans.
   

  Trigger ‘... turkey ...‘ Workshop Results of the Memory Story judged by Margaret Moores followed by readings and synopses from the entrants into the competition. Entrants, please ensure you have a copy of your entry acccessible. Members Share segment A member-hosted writing prompt or activity. The Kathleen Grattan Prize for a Sequence of Poems manuscripts, deadline 6 October (see below), can be handed in to the Competition Secretary at today's Workshop.