(POSTPONED) Archives, History and Memory in Memoir Writing

Cover design by Sophie Herxheimer

Please note that this event has been postponed. We will update this page as soon as a new date has been arranged.

Join writer and academic Marina Warner as she discusses drawing on archives and the interweaving of history and memory in memoir-writing.

Dame Professor Marina Warner CH, DBE, FRSL, FBA is a writer and academic. Her works include novels, short stories and studies of art, myths, symbols and fairy tales. She is a Professor of English and Creative Writing at Birkbeck, University of London. Her memoir, Inventory of a Life Mislaid, focuses on her early years, using memory and imagination as well as writing and objects, to recreate the extraordinary world of her childhood and her mother’s marriage into upper class English life. She has recently presented some of her family papers to the University book and publishing collections, relating to her father’s work in establishing a branch of WH Smith’s in Cairo after the Second World War.

A selection of artefacts from the WH Smith archives held in the University of Reading’s Special Collections will be on display and attendees will have the chance to view this from 5.30pm. Refreshments will be available from 5.30pm and the talk will start at 6.00pm. This event is run in partnership with the Centre for Book Cultures and Publishing (CBCP) at The University of Reading.