It’s a vintage show tonight – an intense blend of wisdom, provocation, information and hilarification – you’ll want to listen more than once to catch everything.  The title comes from our discussion about the quicksilver-like quality known as a writer’s “voice”… what is it, exactly?  Why do publishers prize it most highly and – how do you go about developing it?

Making a long overdue return is our special guest Dr. Susan O’Doherty; writer, clinical psychologist and the author of Getting Unstuck Without Coming Unglued: A Woman’s Guide to Unblocking Creativity.  She’s joined from England’s West country by writer and Litopia stalwart Dave Bartram… from Edinburgh, Scotland, comes Eve Harvey, doyenne of Eve’s Salmagundi Club on Litopia Daily… and from London, novelist, journalist, actress and broadcaster, Amanda Lees.

Topics covered (and links) from tonight’s show include:

• The millionth word has been added to the English language – and its a really crap one… we are being encouraged never to leave our computers… and this really is the end of civilization as we know it…
• Who owns the story? A review of Karl Taro Greenfeld’s Boy Alone: A Brother’s Memoir poses some thought-provoking questions
• Is the Brit Lit scene lowbrow? Jonathan Burnham claims that London book launches are “more sexually active” than New York ones… where, Jonathan, where?
• Canongate’s Jamie Byng on writing that permeates the brain

This week’s titles from the Commissioning Meeting are:

“Up!  Horsie!”
By Clara de Chatelaine

“Unhappy Far-Off Things”
By Baron Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett Dunsany, 1878-1957

“The Unexpurgated Case Against Woman Suffrage”
Almroth Wright, 1861-1947

“The Young Farmer: Some Things He Should Know”
By Thomas Forsyth Hunt, 1862-1927

And don’t forget that we’ll be making a little bit of Litopia history in a couple of weeks’ time when we do our inaugural LITOPIA AFTER DARK – Face to Face.  This will be the very first time that many of panelists have actually met each other – and it’s going to take place on Friday 26th June, at the Poetry Café in London’s Covent Garden.  The venue is restricted in size, so we can only invite Full Members of the Colony along.  If you’re a full member, and you’re in the London area at that time, do pop in and say hello – it kicks off at 6:30pm.  You’ll find full details posted in Café Life inside the Colony.

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