Over the last few months I’ve been writing stories for How the Light Gets In – a live storytelling installation commissioned for Light Night Leeds 2014. I’m writing about it on Short Stops, not only because I’d love you to come, but because, if you’re a writer who believes you have everything to do with the page and nothing to do with the stage, I challenge you to challenge yourself and try it!

Before this, writing was something I mainly did hunched over a desk, or squashed between strange elbows on the train or, if I got lucky, a coffee shop. It is still mostly these things however, the stories for How the Light Gets In have been shaped, directly and indirectly, by the creative writing workshops I’ve been running as part of my commission – and even a series of twitter call-outs. Throwing out my ideas to enthusiastic people of all kinds was a challenging, enjoyable and inspiring experience; I left every workshop feeling emboldened to dig that bit deeper in my work.

Working with actors has also been a new and refreshing experience: playwrights among you will I’m sure know the spine-tingly feeling of seeing your words brought to life in someone else’s body – and transformed into something altogether different from what you had imagined. Equally, you’ll know how badly you want to close your ears and eyes when a certain sentence or idea simply does not work.

If you’re in or around Leeds on Friday October 3, I’d love for you to come and see my first foray into theatre/live art/installation/why we have to give everything a label I don’t know. If you’re not, please take a look at some preview stories here and keep up to date with the project here. Or if you have any thoughts or feelings on how the light gets in – tweet them to me @claresitafisher or get in touch.