Like most authors, when I first heard of the Royal Literary Fund (RLF) it took me a while to understand what it was. I knew it was the oldest literary charity in the world and that its goal was to support writers of literary merit to basically stay out of debtors’ gaol. Or at least that’s what it was when it was first envisaged some 235 years ago.

When I was appointed as an RLF fellow 13 years ago, alongside the work I began to undertake at York St John University — helping mostly doctoral students with their writing — a strange thing occurred: I felt genuinely centred and valued for being an author. As the years have gone on and my role with the RLF has evolved, I’ve come to value this sense of the author being vital to the cultural make-up of the country. It is something I try to pass on to every author we work with.

For me, WritersMosaic, the magazine and platform that forms the global-majority aspect of the RLF, was born out of a seed that took root some seven years ago. It was only then that I was able to fully articulate the degree to which the literary world, both for authors and for readers, was being limited by a centring of literature on a false, yet deeply upheld, set of beliefs: that only 10% of the world’s population is responsible for shaping the majority of art and culture.

This felt like choking hands around my throat. I’d grown tired of being asked to write essays for the BBC where I had to exoticise and explain myself, or bleed, or grieve in my text, whereas another writer could happily write about their five favourite hit singles of the ’70s. When my colleagues and I shared this frustration with Steve Cook, RLF Director of Education, we were heard.

Three years later, WritersMosaic was developed and brought to birth by Gabriel Gbadamosi; it is now headed up by Colin Grant. The RLF and WritersMosaic do things somewhat differently from what passes for the norm. In most places, when it comes to "inclusivity" the question hidden in plain sight is always: who is doing the including? At The RLF and WritersMosaic, we recognise the global exists and that’s it – fact. Therefore our work flows as such. I’ve taken to calling this way of doing things "Rewriting the Mainstream".

My own excitement revolves around transmitting the importance of the author within the culture, and promoting the notion of a better mainstream that values and creates opportunity for a much greater range of authors and writing

In my newly created role, RLF CEO Edward Kemp and I were of a similar sensibility that as the RLF evolves it would need to weave both these incredible aspects of the organisation as one fabric. So, at the beginning of this year, as a writer who has worked across so many areas of the RLF and WritersMosaic, I took up the work of project coordinator for the North, to explore how these two strands could warp and weft together to the benefit of writers across the north of England, an area already rich in RLF Fellows.

So far, it’s been a largely representational role as we begin to build across the region. We’ve met with organisations like Arvon, Tate, the Portico and Leeds Libraries, the British Library – who we are going to be pairing events with – and the National Poetry Centre, as well as the many impressive literary festivals we have across the north, to gently see how we may be of service and walk together to create better infrastructure for British authors and readership, including by opening up some world class opportunities and events outside of London.

We’ve come to realise that, when someone becomes a fellow, or works with us through WritersMosaic, or runs one of our Reading Round groups, in many ways the fellowship acts as a kitemark of quality and professionalism that can really be meaningful in the book world. Part of my role is to look at how we can communicate this in the current literary landscape; for example, we are beginning to pilot a series of public talks inspired by our archives that our fellows across the region are putting on in neighbourhood libraries.

My own excitement revolves around transmitting the importance of the author within the culture, and promoting the notion of a better mainstream that values and creates opportunity for a much greater range of authors and writing. A mainstream where the full range of human experience is welcomed as literature, not just when it fits the familiar template. I’m also thrilled to see that many publishers and organisations are starting to finally see engaging with the global majority as a necessity to survive and grow in today’s world. I’ve had the most wonderful conversations with Faber and the British Library recently that show me we’re not alone in identifying this need.

The RLF and WritersMosaic have both emerged from a circle of human creative endeavour. For more than two centuries, we’ve supported writers including James Joyce, just as he was gearing up to write Ulysses, and DH Lawrence, when he was going through tough times. The list is quite something: Hanif Kureishi, Doris Lessing, Edna O’Brien, Mervyn Peake, Monique Roffey, Ali Smith, Bram Stoker, Dylan Thomas, Antonia White – to name just a few – and many more you may not have heard so much of. Authors in turn have bequeathed and donated to us to continue the work, and everything we do is powered by this circle of mutuality. I’m happy to be the one to face north and share this work in this incredible region of the UK.