Life Lines literary series draws hundreds of people across seven events

The Life Lines literary series brought together a unique group of writers to explore the art of writing the stories of our lives.

The seven events of the series, five panels and two workshops, gave space for people to delve into wider questions of identity, memory and space, and to reflect on the rich source of discovery provided by cemeteries, and Willesden in particular.

You can catch up on the panel discussions below.

Past Mastery: Life Stories from Willesden Cemetery, 07/09/2020

With Anne Sebba, Jean Strouse and Helen Rappaport. A showcase of biography by accomplished authors whose subjects are buried at Willesden.

‘You spoke so well’: Obituaries, Eulogies and Epitaphs, 08/09/2020

With Allan Cowell, Giles Fraser, Aviva Dautch and Harvey Belovski. Summing up a loved one’s life in words can be challenging, so how do the experts do it?

Death, the city and the sense of place, 09/09/2020

With Guy Gunaratne, Xiaolu Guo, Howard Jacobson and Nadia Valman. Join these celebrated London-based writers for a discussion of why ‘place’ is so much more than ‘setting’ in their writing and the approach they each take to creating characters and narratives that tell London’s as well as Londoners’ stories.

What makes a successful memoir? 10/09/2020

With Sally Bayley, Gabriel Krauze, Nikesh Shukla and Rebecca Abrams. Perhaps you are embarking on putting together your own story; how would you go about it?

Family Business at Willesden Cemetery, 13/09/2020

With Thomas Harding, Peter Conradi and Anne Sebba. Join these phenomenal story-tellers as they delve deep into the business of family and the art of biography in this conversation with Anne Sebba.