Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art

This book is about the inner sources of spontaneous creation. It is about where art in the widest sense comes from. It is about why we create and what we learn while doing so. It is about the flow of unhindered creative energy: the joy of making art in all its varied forms.

Free Play is directed toward people in any field who want to contact, honour and strengthen their own creative powers. It reveals how inspiration arises within us, how that inspiration may be blocked, derailed or obscured by certain unavoidable facts of life. How it can finally be liberated – how we can be liberated – to speak or sing, write or paint, dance or play, with our own authentic voice.


Wise, generous and timeless, it has been a touchstone for creativity since 1990 and it is a book that you will find yourself reaching for again and again in times of need. This 2024 edition includes a new afterword by the author and a foreword by Women’s Prize for Fiction-winner Ruth Ozeki.

Format: Paperback
Pages: 256
Imprint: Canongate Canons
Publication date: 18/01/2024
Series: Canons