Trans-Scriptions was a series of talks and readings organized by the Dept. of English & Creative Writing at Lancaster University, in collaboration with Litfest, and supported by Lancaster University Friends Fund and Lancaster City Council. The events were open to an academic and public audience, and focused on the theme of ‘Writing, Culture and Location’; they brought together academic speakers presenting discussion papers, and creative writers in the performance of their work. Each event was held at the Storey Institute, home of Lancaster’s literature festival LitFest, which has a strong track record of culturally diverse programming.
Retrospection took place on Wednesday 7 December 2005. The focus was on writing and critical/theoretical approaches that have developed in relation to decolonisation and might be defined variously as post-war European, postcolonial, Black British, British-Asian, first or second-generation migrant writing. Retrospection featured two talks by postcolonial critics on Black British & Caribbean writing and two readings by well-known contemporary writers - Booker-nominated novelist Abdulrazak Gurnah and Iranian poet Mimi Khalvati. This was a free event which tested University's ability to involve a public audience in academic debate and celebration of contemporary literature.
