Join us in welcoming Graham Caveney in conversation with Octavia Bright on the publication eve of Graham's memoir, The Body in the Library: It is the story of a generation who raised themselves on great music and great literature, and how these might help when you are suddenly on the front-line of life or death.
When Graham Caveney was a child the word ‘cancer’ was unspeakable, only uttered in jokes told by people too frightened to say the word in any other context. Now the boy with perpetual nervousness is a fifty-something man, and the oncologist in front of him is saying words evacuated of all meaning: Inoperable. Incurable.In this startling and deeply moving memoir from one of the great chroniclers of British working-class life, Graham Caveney charts a year of disease from diagnosis to past ‘original sell-by-date’. Shot through with Northerness, tenderness, and Caveney’s trademark humour, The Body in the Library reflects on an unfinished lifetime filled with books and with love.What’s it like to realise that the books on your shelf will remain unread? That the book you are writing will be your last – that you have become your own deadline?
Graham Caveney has written on music and fiction for the NME, The Face and the Independent. He is the author of four previous books, including The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness, which was longlisted for the PEN Ackerley Prize and shortlisted for the Portico Prize, and On Agoraphobia.
Octavia Bright is a writer and broadcaster. She co-hosted Literary Friction, the literary podcast and NTS Radio show, with Carrie Plitt. She presents programmes for BBC R4 including World Book Café and Open Book, and hosts literary events for bookshops, publishers and festivals – such as Cheltenham Literature Festival and events for The Southbank Centre. Her writing has been published in many places, including the White Review, Harper’s Bazaar, ELLE, Wasafiri, Stylist, The Guardian and the Sunday Times. She has a PhD from UCL where she wrote about hysteria and desire in Spanish cinema. Her first book, This Ragged Grace, is published by Canongate.
