#word factory

In the first of our Catalyst Q&A's with people who make things happen, we chatted to Cathy Galvin - founder of the Word-Factory,The Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award and a trustee of Poet in the City.

We have long been in awe of the Word Factory, an informal and extraordinary merging of writers and readers over short stories...and wine! They put on salons and master classes and also have an online platform dedicated to the form. 

Where and when was your love of short stories born and what does the form have above longer forms of literature?

I can trace my love of short stories back to childhood: Angela Carter, DH Lawrence, Sean O’Foalian, Edna O’Brien .. they were simply there and because I wasn’t aware of any artificial division between shorter and longer forms of literature, I still don’t see a divide. Good work is good work. The rest is marketing.  

You’ve had a long career writing as a journalist but do you also write fiction? Tell us about your creative and professional background, where the two overlap and how you ended up doing what you are doing now.

I haven’t written fiction but I do write some poetry – though this hardly qualifies me as a poet. I’m also not a literary journalist: my background is in news and features and I particularly love interviewing. I’ve always been passionate about good writing, wherever I find it and working with some of the best non-fiction writers in the world has shown me how much they read and are influenced by literature. My own work is taking me in to that place often inhabited by people caught between two worlds – literary memoir - but I have a long way to travel down that road yet!

I’m growing the Word Factory as a literary channel with events, opportunities to meet, masterclasses and hopefully a magazine because my life changed a few years ago when I introduced the short story to the Sunday Times for the first time and founded the Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award. I see things as an outsider .. for good and bad. Again, I don’t see the marketing divisions that dog the publishing industry.

Hanif Kureishi is just one of the high profile writers who have been involved with the Word Factory.

In your daily work for Word Factory which side of your brain would you say you use more -assuming we go in for the whole left = logical, analytical, right=emotional, creative? Tell us about the balance between artistic and organisational skills needed in your role.

I’m currently more left brain than I want to be. This is a fledgling business and it needs a strong foundation or the right brain thinking will have little chance to survive.

Tell us a little more about Word Factory’s ethos and how this spirit translates into the atmosphere at your events.

I’ve realised that at the core of the Word Factory is relationship: with the audience, amongst the writers and others who come and between me and everyone who participates. This relationship is about trust and about breaking down some of the barriers that can separate some audiences from writers at literary festivals for example. People comment to me on the informality and warmth and that’s something I never want to lose.