Kathy Henderson in conversation

Kathy Henderson in conversation with OCLW Co-Director Dr Kate Kennedy:
My Disappearing Uncle: How Stories Make Us
Kathy will discuss her book My Disappearing Uncle. Europe War and the Stories of a
Scattered Family. Described by Katya Adler as "Heavy with humanity as well as
meticulous historical research, Henderson‘s account brings to life the sheer
determination and thirst for life of extraordinary individuals over the ages, allowing us
to step into our future with hope, however fragile, the book explores ;...one
scattered family and two hundred years of European turmoil told through the tales
passed down by its undaunted women". Today, Kathy will talk about the way
women’s lives get passed down through oral stories rather than the official annals,
often unexpectedly, piecemeal, by accident, and how much these stories influence
us.
Kathy Henderson is an award-winning children’s writer, poet and illustrator with
more than thirty published books. She has been the winner of, among other things,
the Kurt Maschler Award and the Aesop Prize of the American Folklore Society and
has been shortlisted for the Children’s Poetry Prize. With a background in literature,
music and oral history she also compiled My Song Is My Own: 100 Women’s Songs,
which has become an iconic book on the hidden voices of women. She has written
for radio, visited hundreds of schools and libraries and been a Fellow of the Royal
Literary Fund.