The Books That Made Me – with Professor Lyndsey Stonebridge FBA

Delve into the books that have shaped and inspired the life of award-winning writer and broadcaster Professor Lyndsey Stonebridge FBA whose work on human rights and refugee studies draws on connections between literature, history, politics, law, and social policy.

Join us at the bar from 18:00, with the event beginning at 18:30.

If you are joining the event online, please watch the Vimeo livestream, which will also begin at 18:30.

Speaker: Professor Lyndsey Stonebridge FBA

Professor Lyndsey Stonebridge’s work focuses on the 20th century, exploring contemporary literature, political theory, history, human rights, and Refugee Studies, and drawing on the interdisciplinary connections between literature, history, politics, law, and social policy.

After focusing on the effects of modern violence on the mind in the first part of her career, her more recent writing has focused on the creative history of responses to that violence in two awarding-winning books:  'The Judicial Imagination: Writing after Nuremberg' (2011), which won the British Academy Rose Mary Crawshay Prize, 2014, and 'Placeless People: Writing, Rights, and Refugees' (2018), winner of the Modernist Studies Association Best Book Prize 2018. In 2020, she published a collection of essays, 'Writing and Righting: Literature in the Age of Human Rights' (2020), which drew on her journalism and her work with two major interdisciplinary research projects, Refugee Hosts and Rights4Time.

The work of the 20th-century political theorist, Hannah Arendt, has long been crucial to Stonebridge’s understanding of modern history and contemporary politics. Her new book, 'We Are Free to Change the World: Hannah Arendt’s Lessons in Love and Disobedience', was published in 2024.

Chair: Octavia Bright

Octavia Bright is a writer and broadcaster. She co-hosts 'Literary Friction', the literary podcast and NTS Radio show, with Carrie Plitt. Recommended by the New York Times, Guardian, BBC Culture, Electric Literature, Sunday Times and others, it has run for 10 years and has listeners worldwide. She also presents programmes for BBC R4 including '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 a number of magazines including the White Review, Harper’s Bazaar, ELLE, Wasafiri, Somesuch Stories, and the Sunday Times, amongst others. 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.

Free, booking required

This event will have live subtitles provided by StageTEXT, delivered by MyClearText.

As tickets are free, people sometimes book and don't attend, so we have to issue more tickets than there are seats available to allow for this. Entry into the event is on a first-come, first-served basis and we recommend arriving in good time to avoid any disappointment.

If you have any questions about this event, please refer to our Events FAQs. If your question is not answered, please email [email protected].

Image: Lyndsey Stonebridge at Gathering 2024. Credit Bethany Birnie – OnBeing.