YOUR MESSAGES, the very wonderful book of selected messages from this website was launched last night at the Poetry Cafe in London. We had readers from Texas (I know!), Austria (yes, really!), Manchester, London, Liverpool, Oxford ... from everywhere. And we had a fantastic evening, raising - wait for it - nearly £500 for The Kids Company. Thank you everyone.
But remember you can still buy a copy of Your Messages for yourself and your friends. Every penny goes to the charity. In the meantime, here are a selection of faces to put to the messages. If you have more photos you would be happy to share, please email them to Sarah and she'll put them up... 
The book!
Sarah and Lynne
Ken (pin up boy for November 22nd)
Clare (pin up girl for 23rd November)
('Diggles' - our 29th November star)
We have Book Lift Off!
Welcome!
Hello and welcome to the Your Messages page.
During November 2007, over 100 writers from all over the world participated in this extraordinary project. Using original extracts from the literary collaboration, MESSAGES as a prompt, writers contributed stories, poems, memoirs, lists, etc etc etc of exactly 300 words and posted them here within 24 hours of the prompt appearing.
The results were astonishing. Not just in the quality of the comments - and read them, judge for yourself - but also in how the individual writers reported their process became freer. They surprised themselves - and us.
Now, we are in the process of publishing a book of our favourites from the many many wonderful pieces contributed but we wanted to leave the website as it stands, for you to browse, enjoy and, hopefully, get inspired by!
All proceeds from the project will be going to the charity, Kids Company, and we thank all those who took part for their generosity here too.
Lynne and Sarah
Anthology Selection
As the original Messages were written as stand alone pieces, despite the links between them, we looked for an element of self containment; writing that did not necessarily depend on the posted message. We also focussed on closure, often one of the most difficult things to achieve in short fiction and poetry, and looked for endings that offered some kind of fulfilment, though not necessarily any firm resolution, and certainly not necessarily happy endings. And finally, we had to consider variety, and how the pieces worked all together.
Again, thank you to everyone who took part in ‘Your Messages’; all your names will appear in the book, regardless of whether your work has been chosen or not. And please be assured that every piece has been read by both of us very carefully indeed. Thank you for that.
Sarah & Lynne
Kids Company - our chosen charity
Kids Company
Kids Company was founded by Camila Batmanghelidjh in 1996 to provide for children and young people experiencing significant psychosocial difficulties due to the absence of a functioning parent or carer, which can often have a very negative impact on their ability to access education, health, housing, and meaningful employment. It currently supports 11,925 clients.
The organisation has a multi-disciplinary team working at street level delivering a preventative and reparative therapeutic service to children.
95% of the children refer themselves or their peers to our services, which are delivered through three key channels: 33 schools across London, a drop in centre in South London and a post-16 educational site.
Kids Company aims to promote and support emotional well-being. It assumes that the healing process for these young people is only possible in the context of sustained relationships, and strives to provide each of its clients with practical and emotional help they need.
Kids Company has already made a huge difference to the lives of thousands of kids thanks to the support of all our friends and benefactors over the past eleven years. But there's more to be done and more kids who need their childhood back.
Update
The Your Messages Project, inspired by the collaborative classic Messages, ran from 1st November to 30th November 2007 and attracted over 1,200 responses from writers around the world. We are currently reading, and loving, and selecting work for the anthology, Your Messages, that will be launched on 31st January 2007 at The Poetry Cafe, Betterton Street, London.
If you took part in the project and don't mind spending a little more time with us, we'd be so grateful if you could reply to any or all of the following questions. Feel free to post your reply, with or without your name, via the Comments facility or email us directly:
sarah@sarahsalway.com
lynne@lynnerees.co.uk
- Were you able to identify any changes in yourself, your writing, and/or your writing process during the Your Messages project?
- Have you gained anything by taking part in Your Messages?
- What, if anything, will you miss the most?
- What did you enjoy the most?
- Did you have any other realisations or insights?
Thank-you.
Lynne & Sarah
(p.s. There's no necessity to reply to the questions in exactly 300 words but we'll understand if you need to!)
Welcome
When we started the Messages Project in 2003, it was all about our shared passion for writing and the creative process. We devised a simple formula over coffee one day. Using email, we would exchange 300 ‘messages’ of exactly 300 words, with each one returned within a time limit of 72 hours. Links between each message were made with words, themes, character, form, or even mood. The project took eighteen months to complete and the original Messages was published in July 2006.
From the first hit of the Send button to the final message appearing in our Inbox we enjoyed the energy attached to the project – the excitement of reading new work, meeting the looming deadlines, as well as the challenges and discoveries in language and form. With the new edition of Messages due out in January 2008 we thought we could share some of that excitement with you by creating a mini ‘Your Messages’ project. And we hope you enjoy what we enjoyed: the connections and loops, the playfulness and seriousness, the journeys through the familiar and strange.
For each day of November we’ll post a message from the book and you are invited to make your own link and write your own response. The only thing we ask is that you stick to 300 words and post your response the same day (see note below). 30 of the most interesting and creative responses will be published in an accompanying booklet, the profits of which will go to charity. All the contributors will be invited to read at a special Messages Event in 2008.
Messages was about generosity from the beginning: about gifts of writing, commitment and enthusiasm. We hope you’ll join us in continuing with that generosity. And of course, have fun because we intend to!
Lynne Rees and Sarah Salway
Note: We’ve had a number of queries about the deadline for posting responses so in order to be fair to everyone, particularly people posting from other countries, and continents, we can consider your response for publication if it’s posted on the site before 8am GMT the following morning.
Signed Copies of Messages
There's only 1 shopping day left to order signed copies of the new edition of Messages. You'll have read and responded to 30 of them during this month so why not get the book and have a further 270 writing prompts?
We can add personal dedications, e.g. To the most brilliant 'Your Messages' participant. We couldn't have done this without you, yes YOU... or something rather more subtle. Or we can sign them, as presents, from you to someone you know who will enjoy the book's playfullness.
The link to pre-order signed copies is on the left, and you can let us have specific dedications by email: sarah@sarahsalway.com and lynne@lynnerees.co.uk.
Lynne & Sarah
November 30th
And a very good morning to everyone. Your last Message is the first Message of the book because we don’t believe that endings are really endings, only the beginnings of other things. Messages and the Your Messages Project are proof of that.
A BIG thank you to everyone who has taken part this month. It’s a cliché but it’s true… we couldn’t have done it without you. Please keep checking the site for information between now and January, and in particular for the names of the selected writers on 15th December.
We hope to see as many of you as possible at The Poetry Café, Betterton Street, London on 31st January for the launch of Your Messages.
And please keep in touch.
love
Lynne & Sarah
1
One morning, in bed, he turns his naked back to you and you start to write.
Unthinking at first. You wet your finger, trace letters on his skin. ‘I l...’ Then your hand takes over. ‘...eft you,’ it continues.
‘Mmm...’ he murmurs. ‘Me too.’
You worry about this all day – me too what? So that night, when he’s late for the film you both want to see, you scream at him. ‘People are looking,’ he hisses and that’s when you start to run. But he catches you up, holds you tight by the arm until you calm down. ‘Where are you going?’ You’re not sure, maybe you just wanted to be the one to go. While you wait for the film to start, you read the review. The Loneliness of a Jilted Woman.
Somehow you stay, although you clutch at him so tightly he shows you the bruise later. ‘It’s in the shape of a heart,’ you say wonderingly and then he can’t stop looking at it in the mirror.
‘I’ve been marked,’ he crows and you’re OK just so long as he doesn’t show you his back. You don’t sleep because you need to make sure he doesn’t turn away. You try to understand what he’s saying when he makes those little noises that have never bothered you before. Then he takes a sudden intake of breath and you start to punch him. You can’t stop.
He wakes. ‘Jesus,’ he says, ‘it’s four fucking o’clock in the morning.’
You tell him how he wants to leave you. You’re crying so hard you can’t get the words out.
A month later, you pick up the phone. Hear the message you used to share, except now it’s just his name. ‘I left you first,’ you say. Silence echoes down the line.
November 29th
Good morning to you. We will say it again and again - thank you so much for such brilliant, inspiring responses during this last month. Reading them all has been an absolute pleasure. And here's your penultimate Message.
255
These are some things I'll miss if I die too early…
* mornings like this one, when everyone’s asleep and I’m sitting curled up in the armchair in the kitchen with a mug of hot coffee writing about things that bring me pleasure, but there’s an opening in my chest too and I’m writing direct to the page, concentrating on writing what I see as the truth.
* the chance to live by the sea, to find a country that will absorb me and take me in without being judgmental, that will have water I can go walk by and watch.
* the excitement of meeting new soul mates, who I want to talk to every morning, sit with over long meals telling jokes and ghost stories, fiddling with candles and laughing.
* the pleasure of choosing and trying on new clothes, when I know I look good and can walk down the street and return smiles, when flirting is just fun, that glance between you that says ‘in another life, then maybe, you and me’.
* seeing my name in print and sneaking up on strangers who might be reading my words. That moment when my work takes off without me and I have to run to catch it up, and when I read it, it’s as if it has nothing to do with me and I think – yes, this could be true.
* the heat of the sun on bare flesh, a full glass of red wine, oily spicy food that drips down my chin, stealing looks at people I love, that feeling of pride bursting through my chest when friends do well and are happy, the sparkle of clear water as I break through a clean swimming pool. Good sex, good food, good chat, good poetry. Good.
November 28th
Good morning. Have you written your Christmas cards yet? No? Never mind, here's a Message to get you in the mood.
163
Dear Special Friends
What a better time than Xmas to meet new soulmates! I love to imagine your surprise at getting this letter! Some of you might have gone straight to the bottom to see that the sender is indeed Brian, but this time it’s Veronica-and-Brian as opposed to Jane-and-Brian! I’m pleased to meet you!!
When Brian told me about Jane’s now famous Christmas letters, I thought her tragic death was no excuse to lose touch! Even our therapist has joined our quest to forge a new, special and wonderful relationship (very unlike Jane and Brian’s but that’s another story).
So what’s happening? You’d be amazed to see how much happier Brian looks these days! Jane was a wonderful woman in many ways, but even her friends among you will agree her dress sense wasn’t one of them! I know you’ll all agree that Brian could never be an autumn, so why did Jane keep buying him all those brown clothes? But I digress. To our delight Kevin at Headzone has taken Brian’s hair under control, and his cosmetic surgery is planned for May. Watch this space…!
You’ll probably be relieved to hear we’ve cleared out all Jane’s boring books – what a dust trap! – and painted the walls a nice Magnolia colour. In the garden, we cleared out Jane’s herbs and laid some wonderful trouble-free paving. In place of that horrible old apple tree, there now stands a sculpture of Brian and I making love in celebration of that natural and important part of our lives!
We hope all you special people will visit us. My sweet Brian says I’m too modest, but I’m sure you’ll find my cooking is in a different league to Jane’s homely fare!
Yes, friends, come to this joyous celebration of our love!
Veronica-and-Brian xxx
