French students try their hand at short story writing....in English

Students from Lycée Jules Guesde situated in Montpellier in beautiful, southern France recently transformed themselves into budding short story writers, under the guidance of their English teacher. After shaping and re-shaping their short stories they submitted them to Australia-based international, English language author, Stephen Slater, who took on the very difficult task of judging the stories and selecting three prize winners.

All of the stories submitted, without exception, show flair and originality, and the standard of English is remarkably good. Above all, though, each story has its own 'heart' and 'voice', which together create a uniquely powerful atmosphere within each tale, achieved within the very limited space that a very short story allows. For young students aged 16 or 17, in a foreign language, this is a considerable achievement.

Read a short introduction written by their English teacher

Below, you can meet the three winners and, if your curiosity is strong enough, read each of their stories. Your curiosity will be richly rewarded!

1st prize: Julia FORT

Hi! First, I hope you enjoy the short story I've written, I had fun writing it because I love writing and moreover it's a true story, I had a cat, and it died a few months ago...

So, I'm Julia, I'm 17 years old. ( I will be 18 the 26 of November)

I live in Pignan, in a house with my two parents, Pignan is not far from Montpellier and Jules Guesde high school even if I have to take the bus each morning to go there. I'm in première, I will pass my Baccalauréat this year In June and also next year.

I've one older sister, her name is Marion, she's 18, she's a pain sometimes. I enjoy going out with friends, I also love music, I listen to many different kinds of music as Punk Rock, Pop Rock, Alternatif, Hard rock, Reggae and US Rap...

My favourite bands are Sum 41, Green Day, Coldplay, Muse... The artists I admire most are Michael Jackson, Marshall Mathers (Eminem), Bob Marley.

In my high school, I'm a member of the atelier theatre, I 've been in this atelier for 2 years, it takes place every Wednesday in the afternoon, we have a director, his name is Mathias, he helps us and tells us what we have to do for the scenes we chose to play. I think this atelier is I a very great opportunity for me, and for all the others, because it allows us to interpret a character who can be very different from our personality. Or on the contrary, we can play a character who looks like us. It's a lot of fun, but this also takes a lot a time and energy in order to play well.

I think that once I have my Baccalauréat, I will stay in Montpellier to study Chinese. I don't know exactly the job I want, it may be in tourism, translation, my dream is the become a Journalist...

I love traveling, so I'm hoping that one day I could come to Australia, I also really want to go to the US and to other countries...

2nd prize: Camille BLANCHOD

Camille was born at Dax in the south of France, on September 30th 1994.

Camille Marlène Lessieux became Camille Blanchod following the first marriage of her mother in 2001.

She spent her childhood learning everything she could learn about horses, drawing and reading a lot. She moved 3 times around Bordeaux before she moved to a village in the region called Herault in 2005. 4 years of routine and fun. One more time she quit her village to come and live in Montpellier from 2009 to now.

Now she aspires to be bilingual in English, to improve her Spanish and Japanese and to travel the world as much as possible. She also wants to study psychology at the university.

3rd prize: Clara GIMENEZ

I was born in 1995, so I'm 16.

I like reading and speaking with people, to be able to think about the world and what I want to change in it. Writing is not a hobbie for me, but sometimes it can be a good thing to say what we have on the heart.

I particularly like the time spent with many people, when we listen to music (not very good, but...) and we dance without thinking about tomorrow, but loneliness is a good thing too. I like to be alone sometimes (not everytime !) to think about life and the society in which we live. So I'm not a simple person, I'm special and very complicated, and it's probably not a good thing for the others!!!