Contemporary Cultures of Writing – Spring 2019 seminars 2

This session will look at what it means to research and write about the lives of others. As well as considering a writer’s/biographer’s process, it will consider what her/his role might be, including the notion of “to give someone a fair hearing, to do them justice” (Holmes, 2017). It will also address the issue of how to create a dialogue with the past and why it might be important to revisit the lives of others and to reflect on the interplay between a writer and her/his subject. To what extent are the lives of others a foil for aspects of our own lives?

Professor of Poetry at the University of Roehampton Fiona Sampson will discuss her recent work including In Search of Mary Shelley: The Girl Who Wrote Frankenstein and forthcoming biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. She will be joined by Dean de la Motte, Professor of French and Comparative Literature at Salve Regina University, Newport, Rhode Island. Dean will be discussing his love affair with the Brontës and will be reading from his novel Oblivion: The Lost Diaries of Branwell Brontë.

Organized by the OU’s Contemporary Cultures of Writing Research Group in collaboration with the Institute of English Studies, University of London.

If you have any queries regarding this seminar series, please contact the series convenors, Dr Fiona Doloughan and Dr Heather Richardson, Department of English and Creative Writing, the Open University.

See here for further information about the series.