tayla mocke

welcome to my online writing portfolio!

 

I loved stories before I could read or write. From The Faraway Tree my dad would read me at bedtime to the many (many!) Michael Morpurgo books I'd read myself as a child, my storytelling career is one of humble beginnings. Over the years, these pages have fostered within me a passionate curiosity and hunger to understand the world and her people, as well as my own life. ​I was blessed enough to pursue this passion after school. For 4 years I studied culture, literature and the arts at Stellenbosch University. There, I learnt how to be a critical reader. I also found (and refined) my own voice as a writer. ​Since then, I've been seeing stories all around (and within) me, ripe for immortalizing in the written word. The ones I read in published pages. Those I ink with my own pen. And, most notably, the walking stories I meet along my path. ​So, consider this platform simply a collection of stories: the literature I academically unpack, the personal experiences I try to capture in vulnerable, creative ways, and the lived stories I have had the privilege of bearing witness to.