Practising playing: Thinking through movement and the creative writing classroom

Abstract

This article considers the role of play in the context of creative writing. Taking up Winnicott’s theory of play and Levi-Strauss’s definition of bricolage, I aim to provide a flexible framework that can benefit writers and educators across various creative fields, while avoiding rigid prescriptions of how playing might be enacted. Employing the motions swerving, rebounding and straying , and adding to this set the action of hesitating , I offer an exploded view of my writing practice which serves to demonstrate how practitioners can map the movements in their own creative process, encouraging a playful engagement with creativity that nurtures unexpected and unforeseen outcomes.