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Showing posts from February, 2008

[Interview_3] Jonathan Taylor

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Jonathan Taylor's memoir, Take Me Home: Parkinson’s, My Father, Myself (Granta, 2007) has been described as a “a beautifully constructed and often profound piece of work” which “stands as a fine testimonial to man whose life was a mystery.” Taylor has written two academic books, Science and Omniscience in Nineteenth-Century Literature (Sussex Academic Press, 2007) and Mastery and Slavery in Victorian Writing (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2003) and has co-edited the collection of essays, Figures of Heresy: Radical Theology in English and American Writing, 1800-2000 (Sussex Academic Press, 2005) with Dr. Andrew Dix. In this, the last of a two-part interview, Taylor speaks about Take Me Home , how it got published and how has been received by readers. Who is your target audience? I would say my target audience has various layers. Obviously, people who have experienced Parkinson's disease or dementia in their family (or in themselves) are central to who the book is for. The

[Interview_2] Jonathan Taylor

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Jonathan Taylor has written and published a memoir, Take Me Home: Parkinson’s, My Father, Myself (Granta, 2007). In addition to Take Me Home , he has written two academic books, Science and Omniscience in Nineteenth-Century Literature (Sussex Academic Press, 2007) and Mastery and Slavery in Victorian Writing (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2003) and has co-edited the collection of essays, Figures of Heresy: Radical Theology in English and American Writing, 1800-2000 (Sussex Academic Press, 2005) with Dr. Andrew Dix. Taylor is also co-founder and co-director of Crystal Clear Creators , an arts organisation and not-for-profit company, which records, publishes, produces and promotes new writing, particularly for radio. Currently Taylor is a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at De Montfort University in Leicester where he specialises in prose writing, memoir-writing, radio writing and literature of the nineteenth-century. In this, the first of two interviews, Jonathan Taylor speaks abou

[Interview_3] Brian Wainwright

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Historical novelist Brian Wainwright is a full-time author. So far he has published two novels, The Adventures of Alianore Audley (Bewrite Books, 2005; Jacobyte Books of Australia, 2002) and Within the Fetterlock (Trivium Publishing, 2004). In this, the last of three interviews, Wainwright speaks about how his books evolved; how he got published and about his plans for the future. How did The Adventures of Alianore Audley come about? I wrote quite a lot of comedy when I was young. It got me into trouble at school where there was a lot to parody and ironise. It took me a long time before I realised there was no reason I couldn't put comedy and historical fiction together. Believe it or not, Alianore was originally going to be a serious novel about Richard III. I did some calculations to see whether Constance of York could have had a (fictional) granddaughter active at the time of the Wars of the Roses. (I didn't want to use a real person for this one.) I found that

[Interview_2] Brian Wainwright

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Novelist Brian Wainwright has a deep-seated interest in the middle ages, especially the 14th and 15th centuries; the House of York and the era of Richard II. He has published two novels, The Adventures of Alianore Audley (Bewrite Books, 2005; Jacobyte Books of Australia, 2002) and Within the Fetterlock (Trivium Publishing, 2004). Currently he is working on several other book-related projects. In this, the second of three interviews, Wainwright speaks about the factors that pushed him towards becoming a writer. When did you decide you wanted to write? Very early in life; even as a young child I enjoyed making up stories and writing them down. However, it took me a long time before I thought of writing as something that could be done for an audience, as opposed to just for me. It was even longer before I plucked up the courage to submit something for publication. For many years the idea of doing so scared me stiff. Who influenced you most? A wide array of writers; if I wr

[Interview_1] Brian Wainwright

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Novelist Brian Wainwright made his debut as an author with the publication of The Adventures of Alianore Audley (Jacobyte Books of Australia, 2002), a humorous story about an intelligence agent in Yorkist England. Alianore Audley was followed by Within the Fetterlock (Trivium Publishing, 2004), which tells the story of Constance of York, an English princess who lived in the reigns of her cousins, Richard II and Henry IV. In the first of three interviews, Wainwright speaks about his writing. How would you describe your work? Historical fiction. Within that there are two strands, the serious HF and the comedy projects. My two published novels demonstrate these two sides to my writing. My main focus so far has been England and Wales in the 14th and 15th centuries. I think this will always be my main area of interest, if only because I know the period so well and so don’t have to run around doing masses of new research every time I write a paragraph. However, one of my curr