EDITORIAL
Another wonderful year has swept by with a bountiful load of creative writing from our talented English Department’s Creative Writing Postgraduate students. I can’t believe it’s already our sixth publication of The Quarry since it started back in November 2012 – hopefully when we have a 10th Issue anniversary all the creative writing graduates will be invited to contribute to a special issue with loads of news to share about their success!
But for now, I will talk about Issue Six. We received a diverse number of submissions that included poetry (traditional, contemporary, eco-poetry), creative non-fiction (memoirs and personal essays), and fiction (short stories, novel excerpts, and excerpts from long short stories). I noticed a cohesion and common thread amongst this dynamic bunch. All our contributors dealt with the concept of discovery, whether that was personal, social, intellectual, spiritual, physical, emotional, cultural, creative or philosophical discoveries.
Discoveries can be anything, from finding a book, uncovering something about your family history, researching a historic event, digging up stories from a past society, encountering a secret red door, rediscovering your love for someone or a place, learning new words and phrases, unearthing lost memories, trying to understand ourselves, meeting new people, solving mysteries, and rediscovering our identities. All of these factors then offer new understandings and renewed perceptions of ourselves and others. We change. We learn. We grow.
So Issue 6 hosts a collaborative bunch of writers and their enthusiastic work, demonstrating their passion for creative writing, their developing ethos, their craft, and their talent in the art and science of writing.
I also wanted to congratulate this issue’s editors and thank them: Ally Bodnaruk, Willo Drummond, and Tamara Pratt – without you ladies and your assistance and diligence, we wouldn’t have a cohesive and completed Sixth Issue. Also, a huge thank you to our web designers, Tenzin Bereny and Josh McInnes, for answering my constant emails, being wonderfully helpful and passionate about The Quarry and its thriving future, but for also enlightening me with more digital knowledge! A huge round of applause to Maxine Sundic for her breathtaking illustrations for the Issue 6 Cover, and the Issue #6 Editorial Team Cover. And as always, I’m extremely thankful to Jane Messer for asking me to be the first Editor in Chief of The Quarry. I was very humbled by the opportunity and understood the huge amount of trust it took for her to pass on the many duties and roles of being the sole director of an issue of the e-journal. And we as postgraduate students cannot thank her enough for her endless guidance and support.
And lastly, to our amazing readers, jump on board our Issue 6 ship, hold onto the railing, keep your hats on, and sail away with us to the land of discovery!
Written by Claire Catacouzinos
Editor-in-Chief of The Quarry Issue 6
