Suddenly the memory revealed itself. The taste was that of the little piece of madeleine which…my aunt Léonie used to give me, dipping it first in her own cup of tea or tisane. The sight of the little madeleine had recalled nothing to my mind before I tasted it. And all from my cup of tea.”
Marcel Proust, In Search of Lost Time
“I believe that in each of us there is a small piece of history. In one half a page, in another two or three. Together we write the book of time. We each call out our own truth. The nightmare of nuances.”
Svetlana Alexievich, War's Unwomanly Face
In this workshop led by writer Susanna Crossman, we’ll be looking at memory enhancement and how we use objects, archives and history (social history and micro-history) in life writing. We’ll do practical exercises using our senses and physical objects to create compelling narratives Then, we’ll look at using archives and history as generative tools, and how we can integrate these into personal stories, collaging elements together to create powerful, evocative stories-within-a-story.
For this session you’ll need to come along with a physical object (this could be a cup, a jumper, a ticket…) related to a life- writing project that you’d like to develop. The writing project can be for a book, a personal essay or a short piece.
Susanna Crossman is an award-winning Anglo-French fiction writer and essayist, published internationally in print and online. She’s author of the the acclaimed memoir Home is Where we Start, (Fig Tree/Penguin, 2024), about her childhood in a utopian commune, a Guardian 2024 “Book to Look Out For!” Her new novel, The Orange Notebooks was published by Bluemoose Books (UK) and Assembly Press (NA) in 2025. She has recent work in The Guardian, Aeon, Vogue, Paris Review, Electric Literature & elsewhere. A publisher novelist in France, she was a 2022 Hawthornden Fellow, and will be resident at Hosking Houses Trust in 2025. Winner of the 2019 LoveReading Short Story Award, she was nominated for Best of The Net Non-Fiction and is a member of the Dangerous Women project. Susanna grew up in an international commune. Alongside her writing, she now works as clinicals arts-therapist on three continents, teaches and mentors writers.
NB The time is Central European Time, meaning it is 18h30 UK Time and 19h30 CEST.
