five minutes with erin martin
Erin Martin took the Advanced Life Writing Course in 2019-20 out of which emerged her memoir Trains, about her childhood growing up near a mental hospital where her mother was intermittently a patient. It received recognition with the Bridport Prize. Here she talks about her writing life.
When do you first remember wanting to be a writer? I was about ten years old when I invented a play called The Lost Ring and directed my younger brothers and sister in a performance for our parents. I recall being quite bossy and telling them they would lose their part in the play if they didn’t turn up for rehearsals. In school, from age eleven I loved books, stories, and writing and achieved good marks in written English.
Why did you decide to join the Advanced Life Writing course? I have been life writing in various forms for many years, through private journaling and attending numerous part-time short courses, a residential course, and a full time MA degree course in 2011 at Cardiff University which was uncompleted due to health issues. I am in my seventies now, retired from employment, and Brighton presented me with a fresh start and new opportunities to be a student again. I intended to stay for a year, loved the place, and stayed for six! I tried memoir writing on a short evening course in Brighton and then looked for something more challenging, which is when I found the CWP, and enrolled on the Advanced Life Writing course.
What was the most impactful element of the course for you? The quality of the tutoring and facilitating was superior to any I had previously encountered. I felt I was encouraged to deliver writing of a high standard from the start, and the course material supported that approach. My special thanks go to Hannah Vincent and John O’Donoghue
Tell us about Trains and its inspiration. The title Trains came almost at the end of the writing, when I could see that it was there as an over- arching theme that had emerged naturally. My mother’s death by suicide at age 47 opened up a terrible sadness which permeated my life and the lives of my birth family, and led eventually to the loss of two of my younger siblings, also to suicide.
I view my book as a kind of bearing witness to their suffering, and as a love letter to the children my sister and brothers once were, and to the people they grew into. I am also hopeful that as the sole survivor, and as one who is now at some distance from the raw pain of repeated loss, I can speak on the subject of suicide in a balanced and helpful way.
I want to share what I have learned to do some good in the world, if I can. With this in mind I have added an Introduction and End Notes to the main narrative.
Did you start writing Trains on the course? I started to give some form to all my previous scribblings and also to create new writing, a short time before embarking on the course. This was because I was lucky enough to find a mentor who met with me (and others) weekly, in Waterstones, Brighton. Gary Mepsted was generous with his time, his praise, and his blunt criticism. The CWP further helped me to keep up the momentum, and to see myself as a writer.
What was the experience like of unpicking such a difficult time of your family’s history? It was tough. And walking back down that road again, this time with a writer’s eye for what is, or feels, true, was not ‘therapeutic’ as some might assume. Therapy is best left to therapists in my view, and I actually saw a counsellor at one particularly difficult time, which helped. At other times, admittedly, a large glass of red wine eased the process!
How did you finish your memoir and how was the experience of self-publishing? I remained with my mentor, worked steadily and without a break, other than following a fall on Brighton sea front during lockdown, when I narrowly avoided breaking my nose and/or knee, and was shaken and badly bruised for a while. Then, in 2020, a building issue meant I had to move flats. I resumed writing during the pandemic, completed the manuscript, and began the arduous and time-consuming business of submitting to agents in the hope of finding a publisher.
At some point I decided the odds were not in my favour, and influenced by a friend who was self-publishing, I joined ALLi (Alliance of Independent Authors) and began the journey which led to the publication of my book in 2023.
Joy ensued when my first box of books arrived just two days before I made my move back to Cardiff. It felt wonderful to finally see my book in print, and the subsequent sale of this first small print run raised £500 for the wonderful charity CALM (Campaign Against Living Miserably).
What’s next for you? Well, having achieved a placement in the top 6% of entries to the international, prestigious Bridport Prize for Memoir, 2023, next is perhaps a sequel to Trains, or alternatively, something quite new. It’s time I was writing seriously, again! Meantime I give occasional readings and I talk about suicide and combatting stigma, when the opportunity arises.
What are your top tips for someone writing a memoir? Consider the why, as well as the how, of your writing. Keep going; write and write, and write some more. Your reward will be that you find you have a unique voice in which to say what you most want to say.