Writing is transformative – it can change the lives of writers and their readers. Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Michael Cunningham credits Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway with altering the course of his. Cunningham’s elegant and evocative The Hours (1998) is patterned on Woolf’s book and pays tribute to her both as a person and as a writer. This time, Walt Whitman’s prose is a starting point for his ambitious, time-travelling new novel, Specimen Days (2005). In a different genre, Woolf has also been central to literary biographer Lyndall Gordon, whose work has primarily focused on influential writers. Her bibliography includes books on Woolf, Henry James, Charlotte Brontë and TS Eliot and she has been praised for her capacity to enter the lives and minds of her subjects. Gordon’s most recent publication – Vindication (2005) – tells the extraordinary story of Mary Wollstonecraft, whose powerful intellect and radical politics have influenced many. Lyndall Gordon joins Michael Cunningham for a discussion about writers, writing and changed lives.

 

 

Concession Pass to 15 Writers Upfront sessions of your choice: $150 [FR $140]

If this event interests you, you may also like Beyond the Edge of the Alphabet: Janet Frame and Writers International.

16 Mar, 11:00am