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To close series one, we're revisiting six writers' advice and the experiments it inspired - from Oliver Burkeman's ‘massively eccentric' approach to editing (delete the document, retype from scratch) to Mason Currey's cut-up-your-draft-with-scissors method for finding new connections in your work. Along the way: Emma Gannon on artist dates and solo creative boosts, Benjamin Myers on the writing advice he ignored for years before it caught up with him, Alison Jones on what six minutes of exploratory writing can unlock, and a tribute to the late Peter Elbow – freewriting hero and the writer who convinced Bec that getting stuck might be the most creative thing that can happen to you.
Six writers, six volunteers willing to put the advice to the test, and no guarantees any of it will work for you too. That's rather the point. All six episodes of This Might Work are available now wherever you get your podcasts. Rate, review, and join us on Substack at Breakthroughs & Blocks.
Featuring
Oliver Burkeman is the author of four books and writes The Imperfectionist, a newsletter on productivity, mortality, the power of limits and building a meaningful life in an age of bewilderment. A former colunmist on the Guardian, his book Four Thousand Weeks was a Sunday Times instant best seller. He also wrote the foreword to the book that inspired this podcast Written: How To Keep Writing and Build A Habit That Lasts.
Emma Gannon is the Sunday Times bestselling author of eight books, including A Year of Nothing and Table for One. Her new book, A Creative Compass, publishes in June 2026. She writes the bestselling Substack newsletter The Hyphen, hosts creativity retreats around the world, and served as a judge for the 2025 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction.
Born in Durham Benjamin Myers now lives in the Upper Calder Valley, West Yorkshire. His work spans fiction, non-fiction, poetry and journalism and has earned him some of the UK's most prestigious literary prizes. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and has written for the Guardian, New Statesman, NME, Mojo and many others.
Alison Jones is director of Practical Inspiration Publishing and host of The Extraordinary Business Book Club, a podcast and community for writers and readers of extraordinary business books. She regularly speaks and writes on the business of books. Former head judge of the Business Book Awards she’s written several books herself, including the bestselling This Book Means Business and Exploratory Writing: Everyday magic for life and work.
Mason Currey is the author of the Daily Rituals books - Daily Rituals: How Artists Work (2013) and Daily Rituals: Women at Work (2019) - featuring brief profiles of the day-to-day working lives of more than 300 great creative minds. His new book Making Art and Making a Living examines the collision of creative ambitions with real-world necessities and the compromises that gifted individuals have patched together when facing the eternal dilemma of funding an artistic life.
Peter Elbow (1935–2025) was an American writing teacher and theorist, widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in composition studies. He taught at MIT and later became Professor of English and Director of the Writing Program at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Elbow wrote over 10 books, most notably Writing Without Teachers. He died in 2025 aged 89.
For bonus material and conversations about the experiments featured in the show, visit Breakthroughs & Blocks on Substack.
If you enjoy the show, please leave a five-star review. It’s one of the biggest ways you can help new listeners discover the podcast.
This Might Work is written and presented by Bec Evans and Chris Smith, authors of Written: How to Keep Writing and Build a Habit That Lasts.
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