Eccles Centre for American Studies Writer s Award Photobook,

Transcription

1 Eccles Centre for American Studies Writer s Award Photobook,

2 Inside Front Cover Page Blank Introduction The creative impact of the British Library s collections is nowhere more evident than in the work of the twelve winners of the Eccles British Library Writer s Award pictured here. Each year authors are invited to submit proposals for major writing projects that will use extensively the Library s collections relating to North America. Each prize-winner receives an Award of 20,000. In addition, the Award holders gain a unique opportunity to explore one of the world s great research libraries in the company of expert curators and Eccles Centre colleagues. In the words of one Award holder, it gave me the most extraordinary year in my entire career. With a dozen winners the total Eccles Centre investment so far in these new works reaches almost a quarter of a million pounds just as the Centre achieves its own quarter century. The extraordinarily diverse works produced by our Writers encompassing biography, science and engineering, literary and cultural history, sociology and fiction are opening up the Library s collections to an ever-broadening audience. The Eccles Centre is proud to fulfil the vision of David and Mary Eccles to develop knowledge and use of the British Library s fabulous resources relating to North America, and the Writer s Award serves a special purpose in this mission. These portraits of our Writers are part of a collection of images of people associated with the Eccles Centre created by Ander McIntyre, Eccles Photographer Fellow; they will be held in perpetuity by the Library. Philip John Davies Director, Eccles Centre

3 2012 Naomi Wood, Mrs Hemingway (Picador, 2014) 2012 Sheila Rowbotham, Rebel Crossings: New Women, Free Lovers, and Radicals in Britain and the United States (Verso, 2016)

4 2013 Andrea Wulf, The Invention of Nature: The Adventures of Alexander von Humboldt, the Lost Hero of Science (John Murray, 2015) 2013 John Burnside, Ashland and Vine (Jonathan Cape, 2017)

5 2014 Erica Wagner, The Chief Engineer: The Man Who Built the Brooklyn Bridge (forthcoming: Bloomsbury, 2017) 2014 Olivia Laing, The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone (Canongate, 2016)

6 2015 Sarah Churchwell: Churchwell s work will offer portraits of Henry James as he wrote The Turn of the Screw, interlaced with opposing interpretive takes on the novella itself Benjamin Markovits, A Weekend in New York (forthcoming: Faber & Faber, 2018)

7 2016 Alison MacLeod: Set in the heady days of the 1960 trial of Penguin Books for its publication of the unexpurgated Lady Chatterley s Lover, MacLeod s forthcoming novel will explore the secret force of the trial in very public and private spheres on both sides of the Atlantic William Atkins: Atkins s book about the world s deserts will be published by Faber & Faber in 2018.

8 2017 Hannah Kohler: Kohler s second novel, Catspaw, will follow two women from Chicago to the Sierra foothills during the California Gold Rush of Bob Stanley, Too Darn Hot: The Story of Popular Music (forthcoming: Faber & Faber, 2019)

9 The Eccles Centre for American Studies Blank page The Centre was founded by David and Mary Eccles in 1991 and is based at the British Library which houses one of the world s foremost collections of North American books, manuscripts, journals, newspapers, and sound recordings relating to the United States, Canada and the Caribbean. The Centre works closely with the Library s curatorial teams to promote awareness of these collections. The Eccles British Library Writer s Award and the Centre s Fellowship programme offer financial support for researchers. The Centre also collaborates closely with members of the American, Canadian and Caribbean Studies communities in the UK, and with other partners interested in the advancement of knowledge about North America. It hosts around fifty events a year, and its lively and diverse programme includes lectures, discussion panels, conferences, concerts and seminars aimed at academics, university students, school pupils and the general public. Full details about the Centre s programme can be found at For further information about the Centre contact The Director Eccles Centre for American Studies The British Library 96 Euston Road London NW1 2DB T +44 (0) /7757 eccles-centre@bl.uk

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