charles barrow's writing

I've been enthralled by Green Planet, David Attenborough's latest triumph, currently being screened by the BBC. The production values are just gorgeous, as we've come to expect from these films, but the stories behind the plants that we get up-close and personal with are just extraordinary. I've been watching it on my own but, at least twice in every program, I've asked the TV (and any other piece of furniture that might be listening) 'How the actual Dickens does the plant know to do that?' If it wouldn't alarm my elderly neighbours, I'd be shouting the question. What has been prompting this? Well, here's an example, we've seen a type of grass in Africa that needs its seed to be buried in the soil swiftly, in order to avoid it lying on the ground for any length of time in the extreme heat. So, it disguises its seeds as antelope dung in the hopes that the local dung beetles will roll the seeds away and bury them...at the perfect depth needed f...

I'm dealing with a few health issues at the moment. This is a very dull situation to be caught up in. Thankfully I'm not ill enough to take to my bed, but neither am I well enough to fully participate, or that's how it feels on a daily basis. Consequently, there has been little writing getting done. My focus just isn't up to the task. I can still make notes though; jot down story ideas, outline characters, imagine scenes and situations. And I can still take photos that prompt questions. Photo is the author's own.  

 I went walking through Kipling's Garden in Rottingdean (East Sussex) recently, I'd been looking forward to going for a long while, and it proved to be both a winning and a disappointing experience. Winning, you say? Yes. The garden is quite large and sub-divided into several smaller 'rooms' with different planting, and features, in each. And I was able to wander down brick paths from one room to another, in a haphazard way, enjoying the cobblestone walls, and the peep-hole windows, and the shrubs that were still blooming in November, one with a gorgeous scent, and small pale pink flowers, that I guessed was a Daphne but I couldn't be certain. Disappointed? Yes. Although the garden did originally belong to Kipling when he lived in the nearby house, it didn't look anything like the garden that I walked through, which was transformed into it's current layout/design by a subsequent owner. Hmmm. I wanted to imagine Rudyard wandering through it, and pausing to si...

Traditionally, a  drabble  is a piece of fiction that is exactly 100  words long . Thank you Google. I was completely unaware that a drabble was a thing, especially a fiction writing thing. I'd heard of flash-fiction, and micro-fiction to describe short pieces, but not a drabble. Until, that is, I happened upon a Blogger blog, 101fiction, entirely dedicated to the drabble. They run a monthly drabble writing competition - t he prize is publication in their download magazine. They ask for stories of 100 words, and t hey allow only a one word title, hence the 101 of 101fiction, and they set a different theme each month, this month it's Invention . The whole idea intrigued me. I've never tried writing such a short piece of fiction before, and there was something about that title of Invention that was a great writing prompt for me. So, for that past week I've been writing a drabble. I've really enjoyed the process, the constraints that such a small word limit impose...

Here is an image that really intrigues me. Saw this book, on the railway line, on my morning walk to work. Annoyingly I couldn't see what the book's title was. Maybe I should say, intriguingly I couldn't see what the book's title was. It could actually have been a notebook rather than a novel. It looks artfully arranged there, rather than tossed randomly from a passing train window. It is pristine, not at all scuffed. Was it unloved and discarded, or is it missed and mourned? Did the owner have to get rid of the evidence it contained? Is someone else now searching for it? Images like this make really great prompts for stories. Photo is the author's own.

I took this picture 15 years ago. I was walking home from work, along my usual route, and I saw this piece of graffiti, which had appeared overnight, and it stopped me in my tracks. I remember it made me feel uncomfortable to linger in front of it, I felt like a voyeur witnessing the miserable end of someone's relationship, and I felt very guilty taking this photo and freeze framing their pain and despair. It is such a personal message to Theresa from the wo/man who wrote it and yet it's been very publicly declared. All these years later this kind of thing would pop up in someone's Twitter feed, but back then graffiti was about the only option for posting a message to reach an audience. Although the graffiti appeared on a wall only two minutes away from where I lived at the time, I had no idea who the people involved were. I have to assume that Theresa lived nearby and would walk past this wall on a regular basis, perhaps this is even the wall of her house, otherwise what...