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In her new book, Dr Anna Beer investigates the lives and achievements of eight women writers, uncovering a startling and unconventional history of literature.
Eve Bites Back places the female contemporaries of Chaucer, Shakespeare and Milton centre stage in the history of literature in English, uncovering stories of dangerous liaisons and daring adventures. From Julian of Norwich, Margery Kempe, Aemilia Lanyer and Anne Bradstreet, to Aphra Behn, Mary Wortley Montagu, Jane Austen and Mary Elizabeth Braddon, these are the women who dared to write.
More information here.
Songs We Learn from Trees: Translation workshop and reading 5 May 2022
All are welcome to join the Translation Exchange and translator Chris Beckett, to work together translating an Amharic poem into English. *No knowledge of Amharic is necessary to join in!*
The translation workshop is at 16:30 – register here. It will be followed at 18:30 with readings by Ethiopian poets and a drinks reception, for which you can register here.
Though the pandemic has posed many challenges for students, it has also bred virtual community building leading to innovative ideas and creative ventures.
One such virtual project brought to life by MSt student Anna Seidel and alumna Caroline King is The Napkin Poetry Review: a unique platform advocating for interdsciplinary convergence, polymathic thinking and the power of poetic language in communicating these ideals. In just over a year, their project has grown into a community attracting c.2,000 online readers and destination for consultation and artistic collaboration surrounding poetry and its science as well as how to break down barriers between academic disciplines.
This past summer, co-founders Anna Seidel and Caroline King were asked to develop an artistic installation and poetic design concept to be presented globally for Louis Vuitton as part of their “visionaries” initiative to celebrate the 200th birthday of Mr. Vuitton himself.
Beyond the unique visual design of the journal, the pair also pursue questions around the science and power of poetry as a mental framework and thinking tool. This exploration has been fueled by conversations with scientists, artists, and innovators like Amanda Gorman, Dana Gioia, Dr. Marcelo Gleiser, Dr. Eugene Wassiliwisky, and Alexi Lubomirski to learn more about how they’ve studied poetry and incorporated it into their daily lives.
If you are a cross-disciplinary academic, visual artist, poet or cultural organization and want to exchange, you can reach The Napkin Poetry Review at: napkinpoetryreview@gmail.com
Snow Widows mines never-before-seen archive material to reconstruct the lives of five women – wives, mothers and sisters of the men participating in Robert Falcon Scott’s polar expedition – MSt alumna Katherine MacInnes offers a fresh and utterly different perspective on the race to the South Pole.
Sara Wheeler in The Spectator writes that MacInnes, ‘has produced an elegant, densely textured work, like a tapestry … Snow Widows is a welcome contribution to polar studies and to the popular new genre examining the women left behind. They were only left behind in a geographical sense, after all; their inner lives were as richly complicated – as well as perhaps as unknowable – as those of their frozen-bearded menfolk.
More information here.
This timely and intimate work from MSt tutor and award-winning playwright Barney Norris (The Remains Of The Day) and his father, the internationally acclaimed pianist and broadcaster David Owen Norris, examines that age-old story of a boy and his dad, and how they can relate to one another, in every sense of the word.
An intimate, autobiographical exploration of their relationship, The Wellspring, takes us inside the complex and shifting dynamic between this particular father and son, exploring the
people and stories that shape us.
Directed by Jude Christian, their performances are accompanied by exquisite music performed by David.
More details here.
MSt tutor Rebecca Abrams took part in an event in early March concerning the Arts and Restorative Justice, talking about how she researched and wrote her play The Meeting Room.
The session can be watched here, and here is a link to the blog Rebecca wrote which explains a bit more, both about the playwrighting process and her passion for and belief in the restorative justice process.
In the Oxford Centre for Life Writing Weinrebe Lecture, Helen Mort will discuss her forthcoming book, A Line Above the Sky, which melds memoir and nature writing to ask why humans are drawn to danger, and how we can find freedom in pushing our limits. It is a visceral love letter to losing oneself in physicality, whether climbing a mountain or bringing a child into the world, and an unforgettable celebration of womanhood in all its forms.
You can book for the lecture here, and find more information about the book here.
On 27 January MSt tutor Dr Belinda Jack was a guest on Radio 4’s In Our Time, discussing the novels and life of Colette, whose Claudine series was first published under her husband’s name.