HURRAH FOR THE TROUPERS!

I would like to express a huge thanks to Christine Cohen Park for her article Older Writers: More Room at the Top (WM March). Having completed the final draft of my latest crime novel, ideas for a Christmas novel started to go round my head. My one big question to myself was: am I too old to keep writing? I am in my late 70s and was starting to wonder if it wasn’t time to close the lid on the laptop. Then I read Christine’s inspiring article and I thought, yes, I can do it, I can still write as long as the ideas keep coming. Christine says: ‘It’s probably only going to be a handful of us. But we’ve always been troupers, haven’t we?’ Amen to that and thank you so much again Christine.

PEGGIE BIESSMANN Co. Cork, Ireland

I read with great interest the article by Christine Cohen Park in the March issue of WM regarding older writers. I had recently retired from a demanding job where I was respected (I hope) and people knew my name for what I did. The last thing I wanted was to become ‘just another retiree’ and I was finding it difficult to adjust.

To say that writing short stories rescued me is putting it mildly. I had no idea I could write, although I had created training materials for work and had always admired the written word. When I nervously tested the water with my very first short story at the age of 67 and won a local competition, I felt I was back in the world. People were actually interested again in what I had to say.

Looking into my own experiences and life history, I found it somewhat cleansing to put down on paper my feelings and thoughts, and I hope to represent the older woman in my future scribblings. Yes, we have lived, and many people of a senior age have extraordinary stories that need to be told. It’s certainly never too late to start sharing our experiences.

MAGGIE JAKINS Hailsham, E.Sussex