Writer Nigel’s mission is to help more people get work published

Nigel has been successfully writing for decades, while also engaging with marginalised writers which included a stint with prisoners in Shropshire.

The author also fears the squeeze of austerity is making it harder for new writers to break through and, as such, is preparing to launch his own imprint service. First, however, he wants to make sure his venture is viable by publishing his own work before spreading the net further to support more budding authors.

Nigel, of Walsall, who won The Giles Cooper Award for his play Lifetime, which was aired on BBC Radio, has also written extensively for television, radio and stage.

And MoffiMedia Books was launched yesterday to coincide with Nigel’s new book Dancing On Tables. “The idea was to set something up where I could publish my own work first,” he said.

“I kept being told some of my ideas were great but they couldn’t find the market for them, so I was thinking, ‘how many other writers are going through the same thing?’.

“I decided to set up my imprinting business to launch my work and, once it’s viable, I can look to help out other writers too – but I’ve already started looking for them. I want to see what ideas they have.”

Nigel also wants to help writers who have been marginalised by large publishing houses, those who have been forced to focus on producing commercially-driven work to make money, which he says stifles the art and severely restricts creativity. He strongly believes there is immense talent in the region that needs to be harnessed, especially at a time of austerity and diminished arts funding.

“We can wait for ever for someone to knock the door and offer us our dream, or we can use our own initiative to grasp it,” he said.

“It’s not about success or failure, which is in any case impossible to measure, if they are worth measuring, it’s about participating, self-gratification, in something we strongly believe in. Writers used to be able to make a living out of their profession but most can no longer make enough money.

“The average wage is about £10,000 a year, which you cannot survive on, so many are now looking at others ways of making a living.”

“A lot of books now are published by celebrities who have ghost writers – and many of those are from the south, so you have to think where does that leave writers in the West Midlands?”

Nigel went to Walsall Art College for a year but said because it was “the hippy era of the early 70s so, like a lot of people, I dropped out”.

But during that time he read as much as he could and spent most his time in the library, which developed his love of writing.

He also likes music and even played the guitar and recorded with Paul Weller in London after writing a song, but now he is concerned about the impact austerity is having on the arts.

“Libraries are closing all over the country,” he said. “The gallery in Walsall was due to close, The Drum, in Aston, closed, a lot of dance companies have around the West Midlands have folded since the Conservatives came into power.

“I’ve run a lot of writing groups around the West Midlands over the years, which including winning the Butler Trust Award for my work with the writing group at Shrewsbury prison.

“A lot of writers contact me to try and help them so although the groups no longer meet weekly we keep in contact over the internet.”

Through his work, Nigel has brought writers and musicians of the calibre of Labi Siffre, Jean Binta Breeze and Benjamin Zephaniah to perform at venues across the region, to inspire new writers.

His last production was Musical Youth at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre, about the boy band who went to number one in the charts during the 1980s with their hit song Pass The Dutchie.

Nigel also inspired prisoners in Shrewsbury to publish a book about life behind bars, called Inside, which consisted of short stories, poems and extracts, and wrote the play Mama Decemba, which won the prestigious Samuel Beckett Award

And when it comes to his books, he says he never knows who his target audience will be but added the inspiration for Dancing On Tables had come from a personal loss. “This book is about human existence, what we all experience and what inspires me,” he said.

“The idea came from remorse after we lost someone close in our family. It just came to me.

“Sometime a story is already out there just looking for the author to write them, but unless you read it, you’re never really going to know what it’s about.

“I’m very passionate about it and I just love doing it.

“I have been writing and teaching for as long as I can remember and it may seem strange but I didn’t choose do it, I chose me – and I love it.”