Conversations from older women in south-west England

In a forum with older women hosted by Literature Works in south-west England, author Louisa Adjoa Parker, photographic artist Susan Derges and musician Ruthie Behan spoke to Literature Works Chair Pippa Warin about their lives and careers. Themes that emerged from their talk and the ensuing group discussion were:

Life experiences and creativity

‘Different kinds of older women’

The challenges of being an older woman artist

Inspirational older women

The benefits of being older

Taking solace in creativity

Mentoring younger women/artists

Click on a theme to jump to it, or scroll down to read all.

Louisa Adjoa Parker

Louisa has lived in the south-west of England for almost forty years, but when she first moved to Devon it was very challenging, as she was the only person of colour in the area for years. She’s always been drawn to writing and used to write stories and poems as a child, largely as an escape from the racism surrounding her and the domestic violence in her family – she didn’t feel particularly safe anywhere. As a teenager, Louisa wrote extensive diaries about being a mixed-heritage teenager in Devon in the 1980s, which she’s used to form a memoir (published in 2023 by Little Toller Books). 

Louisa began writing properly in her twenties, after her return to education; she was excluded from the sixth form at the age of seventeen in Totnes. A few years later she moved from Devon to Dorset and became a single parent with three daughters. It was very challenging, with lots of intersectional experiences: race, gender, being on a low income, being on benefits, the issue of rural deprivation which she feels very passionately about. Louisa was struggling a lot and then one afternoon had a sense that she wanted to do something to change her life; she didn’t have to be a victim. So she started studying Sociology, distance learning from Weymouth College. She loved learning about sexism, racism and inequality – all the things she’d been thinking about but didn’t have the words to explore. She finished her degree at Exeter University and, while she was there, started writing poetry. 

I realised I had a lot to say. To begin with I wanted to talk about my experience of being mixed heritage, but also exploring themes of motherhood and gender and living in the south west. It began as a hobby but I was fortunate to have support early on from Selima Hill, who’s a fantastic poet. She kindly looked at some of my work and inspired me to keep going and helped me believe that I had a voice. I’ve written lots of poetry, short stories, and I’m working on a memoir. I’m passionate about telling the stories of marginalised voices from the south-west, from an intersectional perspective, thinking about race, ethnicity and gender, but also understanding that we can all belong to different categories and that no human really fits any one box. I’m a grandmother of five and life has changed as an older woman. There are new challenges but I definitely have more headspace than when I was a single mum of small children.

Ruthie Behan

Ruthie is a seventy-year-old musician who feels that anyone who is older has a long story to draw on, but that they are also up against a lot of stereotypes which can hold people back. Ruthie is from a working-class family, but not a typical one; one of her uncles was a famous writer, another was big in the traditional music scene and her dad was a rampant trade unionist. Ruthie has always played music: 

I couldn’t not do it because it’s so enjoyable. 

Ruthie is dyslexic but didn’t realise it. She had the chance of a good education because she passed the eleven plus exam and went to a good school but, being dyslexic, could never produce any writing by hand that was seen as acceptable. She wrote something which her teacher wanted to put in for a Sunday Times competition, but kept having to write it out again and again as she found it impossible to write neatly. Years later, Ruthie entered a competition run by Literature Works and remembered a story of when her Dad found out that Stalin was actually a bastard. On their mantelpiece, Stalin stood on one end with Trotsky on the other. Ruthie came home from school one day and found Stalin smashed up in the garden. She asked her Dad what happened to Stalin, but he couldn’t answer as he was weeping and swearing at the same time. One of her daughters told her it was a great story and she should write it for the competition. 

Being working class, I just thought ‘Well, I’ll probably get a free tin of biscuits or something’ – I didn’t realise what a huge opportunity it was! I got loads of help. I’ve also got a complete historical novel with lots of sex and horses in it in my head! But I haven’t got time to do it all and I have to focus on music because I was getting some money and recognition and lots of fun from the music. And then with the writing – I think it’s a bit of a working-class thing, but am I going to get any money for it? Am I just going to spend hours and hours on it, then send it all off to get an agent … I sent it out to about six and then I just wimped out and went back to music. As far as that’s gone, I’d say it’s ‘halfway up the T-shirt’ because when you do festival gigs your band name on the back of the T-shirt is halfway up [the big bands have their name at the top]! 

Susan Derges

Susan remembers her schooldays with not such fond memories: failing the eleven plus and not going to a good school. Her solace was painting, which became a point of reference during times when she wasn’t getting on very well at school. She went to art school throughout the 1970s and all the teachers were male. She learned about male artists, which made it difficult to orientate herself as a female in that world. 

There was a sense of wanting to become one of them, an artist, but of not really having a helpful role model and all the questions about having children or earning a living were swept aside because, although you were encouraged and taught, you were not taken on that seriously. 

There were a few women at art school who were hugely important to her. Helen Chadwick was really breaking ground as a woman artist, doing performances and making work with photography. 

There was a sense that a lot of women at that time didn’t fit into the brackets of ‘the great painter’ or ‘the sculptor’ and many of the available role models weren’t quite right, so women were re-inventing the medium in some way and Helen was a great example of just pulling it all apart and playing with photography – she did amazing things with photocopiers and her body in relation to the natural world. She was a figure for many people of my age. 

After graduating Susan went to Japan and had a welcome chance to reinvent herself on a year’s scholarship, eventually staying there for six years. During that time she studied Eastern spirituality and Buddhism. She moved to Dartmoor, where the landscape possessed and took her over and for twenty years her work was led by the cycles of life on the moor, working with frogspawn, cycles of birth, life and death and with the River Taw.

Looking back on that period, I regret that I didn’t have the confidence to hold back and pace myself better … But I had the feeling that I hadn’t got the right to say no to the invitations that were coming my way and that I’d never have these opportunities again if I did and that I should be eternally grateful. But I was rather run ragged by the end of this time and slightly burnt out. But when I got to sixty, it suddenly stopped overnight – partly that was to do with the medium of photography and the analogue processes all drying up – but also I’d just come to the end of something. It was a huge relief to be able to spend some time reflecting and looking back at what had been going on. That’s one of the things that I think of as a value to reaching this stage as a woman.

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Susan Derges

One thing Susan has to come to terms with is that she is by nature introspective. She spent a lot of her life trying to be extrovert, to deal with the expectations of what you have to do as an artist – putting yourself forward for talks or public appearances and pushing your work in certain ways. 

When I was younger, if I’d understood what my inherent nature was and paced myself according to that, I would’ve had a smoother journey. But that’s one of the things that drops in as you get older. You slow down because you don’t have quite the same energy to keep moving forward at the pace you have been. That’s of immense value, because you have an opportunity to figure out how your core personality can operate to its maximum effectiveness to deliver whatever it is that you really want to deliver. 

Susan has some wonderful female friends. One friend is twenty or so years older than her and is an informal mentor whose example has informed her a lot. She’s a photographer, still working at the age of eighty-five, with a graceful and empowered way of running her life. She never steps outside her own pace and she does masses and is very effective at what she does. Susan also has much younger friends who energise her with what they’re doing and are excited by, so she values those hugely. Exchanging experiences is key. 

Ruthie Behan

In music, there’s the stereotype of the beautiful singer who gets to the age where she doesn’t look as she would like to. Ruthie herself had many doubts around using her personality rather than appearance during performances, but when she did, there was a better response from the audience. 

Obviously I do what I can (I don’t turn up in my pyjamas!) but writing has an advantage as it doesn’t matter what you look like. 

Louisa Adjoa Parker

Louisa has always been something of an extrovert, but when she first started writing she was very nervous about reading in public. She realised if she was serious about writing, she had to get over this. 

I’m new to being ‘older’ as I turned fifty this year, but I think I’m more confident in terms of who I am and comfortable in my own skin. I struggled with who I was for years – there were no role models living in the West Country as a black women of mixed heritage. I didn’t know who to be so, I leaned into the stereotype and became a single mum on benefits, I didn’t know what else I could be. 

She now feels confident in her identify, but still worries that she’s not where she wants to be with her career as she’s now more ambitious than ever. Louisa is inspired by artists such as Ingrid Pollard and Bernardine Evaristo. With literature, there isn’t such a cut-off point with age. 

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Louisa Adjoa Parker

Louisa describes the physical challenges like perimenopause which have an impact on mental health, with anxiety and sleep problems getting worse. There’s also chronic pain which she feels may be embodied trauma. 

There’s the challenge of being a young grandmother. I work full time and I worry I’m not supporting my daughters with their children and I want to spend time with my grandchildren as well, so there’s that struggle and that work/life balance that we all struggle with. I went straight from being a mother with two teenagers at home to being a grandmother with no space in-between. You have different phases in life, don’t you, but I don’t have enough space and time to spend with my family. 

Also, there’s no answer to the question of dealing with the money side of being an artist.

Ruthie Behan

After her degree, Ruthie put a lot of work into her day job which was in childcare and did lots of different jobs around that. She also got ME, which was a big challenge. And although gigs are a challenge, as soon as she hears music, the pain goes. 

All my life I’ve stopped myself from doing things because somewhere I feel I didn’t deserve it. And now I’m old, that seems to have gone. If I go and do a gig now, I think I don’t care if this is my last – it’s like you’ve not got much to lose, what the point in giving up now?! Getting the old age pension is like the dole for musicians. 

Susan Derges

Susan’s energy levels are so much less now. She didn’t used to feel there was any barrier; she could work through the night and felt it was all possible. Now she’s aware of her limits and has to pace herself and say no more often. The inclination is to say yes because you want to do things and you’re pleased to be asked, but it’s better to think about how you’re going to apportion your priorities. 

You don’t know how much more time left there is to keep making. I’ve got carpal tunnel in my right hand … so there’s this feeling of now or never. I do feel that urgency of wanting to try things out … and being liberated to focus on what’s important by a sense of time running out. 

Also, she is grappling with her reluctance to engage with social media for the work. 

I’m of a generation where I haven’t got my head around that. I do work digitally and in a digital arena, but I felt so uncomfortable about publishing things on Instagram although I’m aware there’s a whole cultural life happening on the internet. But I don’t like the way it operates and how one’s distracted and flooded with things you haven’t asked for. I occasionally look in and post events but then I’ll get a flurry of information back and start to think I’m missing out. But the work comes for me from living a more reflective life, with a contemplative approach, so I can’t easily move that across into pushing myself forward in the way that people do on social media. It feels inauthentic. But I see it gives you access to a fantastic wider audience of diverse people and ages from all over the place. 

Susan Derges

The painter Agnes Martin who got herself out of New York into the middle of nowhere and built various studios and was able to work to a late age. She gave the most powerful talks. She painted huge abstract colour-filled work all her life but one of her last pieces was a tiny drawing of a flower. 

There’s something interesting about a self-directed, powerful life, finishing with such a tender, hopeful image about life. 

Louisa Adjoa Parker

The poet Jackie Kay. Her poem ‘In My Country’ about walking in the countryside and a white woman looks at her suspiciously, resonated. 

The artist Ingrid Pollard. Louisa saw an image of a black woman in a field that she’d taken as part of an exhibition in the 1980s.

I was blown away because I’d never seen a picture of a black woman in a field. It’s inspiring that Pollard has now been widely recognised for her work. 

Ruthie Behan

Musician Memphis Minnie. It says on her sleeve notes, ‘she plays the guitar like a man’, https://memphismusichalloffame.com/inductee/memphisminnie/

Josephine Baker, Bessie Smith, they are working-class people who have used music to help them through rough patches. 

Audience

The Katie Hessel podcast of inspiring women artists was recommended. See https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-great-women-artists/id1480259187

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Audience

At the age of sixty, I’ve just returned to study; I’m doing a Masters in Glasgow by Zoom. I was really worried about doing that, about being with lots of young, bright people. But I think I’m much more willing to take risks than a lot of those younger students, much more willing to make myself vulnerable, to make an arse of myself basically! Because I just don’t care. I feel I’ve got this opportunity and I’m not going to waste it by worrying what other people think of me. There’s lots of downsides but that’s a real positive. 

Ruthie Behan

I was going to say about the menopause, I found that after it was all finished and done, I was much better. It’s like being twelve again or something. It may not be relevant to everybody, but I feel more confident.

Audience

I agree and what’s so good is hearing a positive take on it. It’s a miraculous thing that the body can turn one thing off. These changes in life can be really incredible, so it’s great to just hear it out loud. 

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Pippa Warin (Chair)

Mental and physical health is something that you’ve all referred to and often we are more honest about that and how it’s part of our lives and creativity. You’ve also referred to comfort and solace and where you go to when times are hard and you’ve all mentioned that that’s also a place where your creativity and art has perhaps helped, comforted and maybe also been a way for people to think through your hard times. Can you talk a bit about solace in your creativity?

Ruthie Behan

Ruthie recounted about how she used to smoke and deal cannabis as a kid and then someone sent her a record of the blues. Music is a healthier drug. 

Susan Derges

Looking back on her childhood, Susan’s homelife was difficult because her father was depressed. Art brought solace to that and is a comfort. Nature is also a healing experience.

Going into that studio space is like going into the unknown and then the work shows me where the healing is. 

Pippa Warin (Chair)

Our creativity is very tied up with discovery and self-discovery. I’ve come to writing late in life and I do that as part of a process of thinking, of trying to understand and of discovery. 

Louisa Adjoa Parker

Louisa views writing as only one part of what she finds solace in. She loves music, going to reggae festivals and also activities such as yoga and swimming.

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Pippa Warin (Chair)

How do you think you would mentor a younger woman/artist with some of the experiences that you’ve had? You will be seen as mentors and are inspiring women yourselves. What would you say to somebody who’s trying to develop their own creative work and journey as an artist?

Louisa Adjoa Parker

I’d say to someone younger to just believe in yourself. We’ve all got a story to tell, we’ve all got layers of experience we can tie into something creative and share in the world. So I’d encourage younger people to believe in themselves more. I want to encourage them to be present and live in the moment a bit more. There is a tendency for all of us to get caught up in all the things that don’t really matter, such as appearance. 

Susan Derges

It’s this thing of self-consciousness as a real obstacle. Trying to affirm to someone that what they want to do is great and not to be too self-conscious about where it fits in so much as going with the enthusiasm of what they want to do. To believe that it’s there and to go for it rather than worrying too much about where it fits in because that comes later. I see too many people trying to contextualise what they want to do or thinking about being accepted or having a place. Just encourage people to do what they want to do, without contextualising and with less self-consciousness. 

Audience

There are structures that help women to have a more formal mentoring resource, such as Arvon who ran a mentoring project with six new writers paired with more experienced writers and that totally worked. But funding structures need to enable more mentoring. See Caroline Criado-Perez’s book Invisible Women: Exposing data bias in a world designed for men.

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Literature Works is a dynamic writer and reader development team at the centre of regional networks in south-west England. We engage communities with creative self-expression through words and stories. Our vision is a vibrant, connected and sustainable culture of stories and words, where inclusion is prioritised, diversity celebrated and opportunity available to all. We use our artform to help enrich lives, strengthen communities, enhance well-being and explore pressing issues such as climate change. We enable new voices to be heard. We use a combination of digital and place-based delivery to achieve broad reach via secure and supportive networks. We offer writer training, produce live events, run advice sessions, workshops and writing courses. We support talent development, nurture new initiatives, and connect writers with communities. At any one time we lead a range of projects and partnerships, from the Quay Words live literature programme in Exeter – a UNESCO City of Literature – to the training of local poets and delivery of dynamic poetry workshops at Memory Cafés through our Poetry Cares project, sharing the joy and power of poetry with people living with memory loss and their carers. 

See www.literatureworks.org.uk and www.quaywords.org.uk