Saturday 16 May Full Day Life-Writing Workshop: ‘Disputed Lives’

The following life-writing workshop on Saturday 16 May still has
limited space and is open for booking.

Saturday 16 May (Week 3), 10 am – 4.30 pm, Oxford Centre for
Life-Writing, Wolfson College, Oxford

Full day workshop: ‘Disputed Lives’

Price: £70 (£55 unwaged)

Booking:  http://www.oxforduniversitystores.co.uk/browse/extra_info.asp?compid=1&modid=1&catid=1784&prodvarid=1012

For those engaged in writing or researching life-writing, the
emergence of conflicting narratives or evidence in life-stories always
poses a challenge – and a subject of fascination. This full-day
workshop will encourage participants to examine areas of dispute that
may have arisen during their own research: from existent biographies
presenting conflicting versions of a subject’s life, to source
materials or witnesses testifying with dramatically different
evidence. The workshop will explore the range of reasons for such
apparent conflicts, and will foster discussion about ways in which to
manage, reconcile and interrogate these alternative genealogies.

The workshop will include three speakers presenting ‘case-histories’
of their own tussle with conflicting biographical evidence: the
award-winning author and journalist Rebecca Abrams, the assyriologist
Jacob Dahl and his cousin Noa Lavi (both currently wrangling with
their own contested family history), and the literary scholar Kate
McLoughlin (who will talk about the rivalry between Ernest Hemingway
and Martha Gellhorn concerning landing on the Normandy beaches on
D-Day). OCLW’s director and associate director, Hermione Lee and
Elleke Boehmer, will lead interactive workshop sessions designed to
help attendees turn complex evidence into narrative shape in their own
projects. The whole workshop will take place in the beautiful
surroundings of Wolfson College, and will include lunch and
refreshments throughout the day. Numbers are limited to 30, to allow
for delegates to benefit from small-group interactions.

Oxford Centre for Life-Writing (OCLW),
Wolfson College Research Clusters,
Wolfson College,
Linton Road,
Oxford.
OX2 6UD
oclw@wolfson.ox.ac.uk
www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk/clusters/life-writing