Category: Writing
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Lots of writing opportunities in May
Poetry Café, Coffee on the Corner, Littleborough, 6pm to 8pm – Tuesday 5th May Come along to share or listen to poetry a great open-mic style event. There is always a great variety of poetry and should you wish to read (your own work or favourites) please let Seamus know on arrival so you can…
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Riverside Writers Workshop, Poetry Café and a New Online Writing Group
Riverside Writers Workshop – Crystal Thursday 30th April, Rochdale Central Library, 10am to 12noon – Free This week Seamus Kelly will be leading a workshop entitled Crystal. Apart from it’s chemical and physical meaning Crystal is very much associated with Clarity. In this session we will look at, and get to try, some of the…
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‘Let me be kept warm by the bridges I have burnt’ – Plus future Town Hall Courtroom visit
Writing Workshop – Eileen Earnshaw – Thursday 23rd April Rochdale Central Library 10am – 12noon Using a literary quote about burning bridges Eileen will be leading a workshop all about revenge. Careful now! your actions might have repercussions. No need to burn anything but just bring along something to write with and join us. Anyone…
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Katie Haigh at Riverside
The Dreaded Blank Page – Rochdale Central Library, Number One Riverside, 10am – 12noon This week we are delighted to welcome Heywood based poet and writer Katie Haigh as a guest facilitator. Katie is known as the leader of the monthly Heywood Scribblers writing group, previously led a writing group at Darnhill and facilitated for…
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Poetry Café and Riverside Writers
Another week with plenty of opportunity to get our creative writing juices flowing with two local events: Time – by Eileen Earnshaw Rochdale Central Library, Thursday 9th April, 10am – 12noon This week Eileen will be leading a workshop around the concept of time and its use in literature. What a great way to spend…
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Build-a-Story – Thursday 26th March
Rocdale Central Library, Nounber One Riverside 10am to 12noon At our session this week Seamus Kelly will take us on a trip through making stories. Think Build-a-Bear but instead a bear we’ll make stories, instead of picking an outfit we’ll make characters, instead of pumping it full of stuffing we’ll inject ideas and plot. And…
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Sestinas – Thursday 19th March
Rochdale Central Library – 10am to 12noon A focus on poetry this week as Eileen Earnshaw will be bringing us a workshop about the Sestina – a French poetic form that…. Maybe I’ll wait until Thursday morning before saying more. Anyway that almost explains the French photo for this post. As always there will be…
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Flash Fiction – 12th March 2026
Rochdale Central Library 10am – 12noon This week Seamus Kelly will be leading a workshop on Flash Fiction. Flash Fiction means short (very short) stories and is an increasingly popular genre. We’ll look at various examples, find out more about the format and concepts and of course we’ll have plenty of opportunity to create and…
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Marching into Spring
The first week of March is another one full of creative writing opportunities and events. Tuesday 3rd, 6pm to 8pm – Poetry Café, Coffee on the Corner, Littleborough A welcoming and supportive open mic style evening with great poetry and atmosphere. The event is free so please support our venue by purchasing some of…
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Journeys Workshop
Rochdale Central Library 10am to 12noon Thursday 26th February This week at Riverside Writers Seamus Kelly will be inviting writers to take a journey. Destinations, times and all sorts of storylines will open up ahead of us with a series of writing exercises. Whether writing stories, poems or any other genre there are…
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Happiness
Thurs 19th February, Rochdale Central Library This week at Riverside Writers weekly session Eileen Earnshaw will be leading a creative writing workshop focused on “Happiness”. With examples and discussion there will be plenty of opportunity to create new pieces of writing – plenty to be happy about. Just bring something to write with and your…
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Never Never – Workshop with Ray Stearn – 12th February 2026
Well! what an inspiring week of creative writing and poetry in Rochdale, including a great performance by Riverside Writer, Yasmin Hussain, standing up really well alongside some seasoned top performers including Rochdale Young Poet in residence Alende Amisi, Sid Calderbank, Hafsa Aneela Bashir and Mike Garry. For more about those recent events please visit One…
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February starts with plenty of creative writing
This week there are several great creative writing events in Rochdale as well as our own weekly Riverside Writers session. Here are the details in brief: Monday 2nd February, Northern Rascals, 5pm to 6.30pm, Rochdale Northern Rascals are bringing a special creative session to Richard Street Studios on Monday and have invited members and…
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Refuge – Thursday 29th January
For the Riverside Writing Group session this week Seamus Kelly will be leading a workshop titled “Refuge”. In view of the things happening in the USA and other parts of the world and the prevalence of anti-immigrant feeling in some parts of the UK it seems an appropriate time to look at refuge once again.…
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Jan 22nd – Writing Animals
This Thursday 22nd January our workshop led by Seamus Kelly will consider “Writing Animals”. In this session we will consider different approaches, writing from different points of view, and look at some examples (well known and less so). There will be plenty of chance to write and share. This workshop should be informative and help…