this itch of writing: the blog

This page is about my writing blog, This Itch of Writing. It has recently entered an exciting new phase of life, hosted on Substack. There you can read the public posts and have them emailed to you. What’s more, if you become a supporter or a super-supporter, you will receive extra, exclusive posts, be able to join in with the community conversations and chats - and know that you are helping me to keep the Itch going and growing.

But if you’re a long-time reader of the Itch and its famous Tool-Kit don’t worry! There are still sixteen years’-worth of the original Itch posts fully accessible back on Typepad, although I won’t be posting any more new pieces there, and comments are now closed.

This Itch of Writing was born in 2007, in the days before social media when blogging was the only real way to carry on a conversation with readers. And since writing is the only thing that I think about every day of my waking life, I decided to blog about writing. Since then, the blog has established itself not just among individual writers, but also in writers’ forums, and professional and university creative writing courses all over the world. Most recently, with Substack, I’ve found a similar community growing, again, around blogging, but with all the speed, ease and interactivity that we’ve become used to on Facebook, Instagram and and the place formerly known as Twitter.

The title comes from John Donne, who complained in a letter to a friend that he had been waiting to have some news, as an excuse to write to him and thereby “scratch this itch of writing”; but as nothing newsworthy had happened, said Donne, he was going to write anyway. It’s a nod to the drive to write, which is also to communicate.

To find out more, click through to Substack or straight to This Itch of Writing with Emma Darwin, have a nose round, and maybe subscribe. It would be great to see you there!