Episode #2

“The impulse I get to put pen to paper, is something that I think the readers may have not seen much of and that really tickled my fancy when I first saw it.”

Today, I’m speaking to Jessica Mudditt. 

Jessica is an Australian journalist and author based in Sydney. Her articles have been published by the BBC, The Economist Intelligence Unit, GQ and Marie Claire, among others. She worked as a journalist in England, Bangladesh and Myanmar, before returning home in 2016. 

She recently published “Our Home in Myanmar”, her debut memoir about her four years living in Yangon in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma. 

I asked her about her writing process and it was fascinating to hear how she managed to build a life as a foreigner and operate as a journalist in one of the most politically closed countries in the world, while her editor was in jail. We talked about how what started out as a light read about living in a country as it opened up, became more of a historic depiction of the few short years of democracy from 2012 to 2016.

In this interview, I ask Jessica about how she uses place for inspiration, how she grounds herself in foreign places and what it’s like to be living in her home country again.

She shared her thoughts on: 

• How being away from home helps sharpen your lens
• How to frame rejection and look for the right home for your ideas
• How to find your creative path 
• How to approach pitching as a freelance journalist
• How to learn from editors

You can find Jessica's work here, as well as the books she mentioned in the interview:

• Our Home in Myanmar by Jessica Mudditt
• Finding George Orwell in Burma: Amazon.co.uk: Larkin, Emma ...
• From the Land of Green Ghosts: A Burmese Odyssey by Pascal Khoo Thwe
• Jessica Mudditt's website
• Jessica's Twitter Account 
• Jessica's Facebook Account
• Jessica's Instagram Account

For more detailed episode notes, go to my website Curativity.me