Paper Nations Emblaze Skill Swap Session with Pascale Petit

My Hummingbird Father: Inter-generational Storytelling, Transformation and the Multiple, Magical Lives of Daughters in Realm of the Living World

Literature is important because it can transform the pain of life into beauty. I don’t think it should hide the pain, but it has this magical ability to transform, to change “what happened” into “what happens in the art”. (Pascale Petit)

Pascale Petit FRSL winner of RSL Ondaatje Prize (2018) and Laurel Prize (2020) will be in conversation with Davina Quinlivan, exploring the healing power of inter-generational storytelling and the role transformation plays in conjuring the living world (and the ‘spirit world’), its magical invocations and its conflation with various figures within Pascale’s body of work, across the forms of the novel and poetry. Pascale will share her experience of creative writing and the transitions she has made from The Royal College of Art as a graduate of sculpture to award-winning poet and, more recently, novelist. Davina will discuss her use of creative non-fiction to explore her family histories, while Pascale will share her exploration of mixed heritage, Indian/French identity and poetry/novel writing, both discussing the skills required to tell stories and re-imagine their shared histories as ‘daughters’ of the British Empire and Post-Colonial identity. They will also discuss the potency of art and its potential to recover memories and emotions, especially their deep sense of mythology and image-making and their shared love of Henri Rousseau’s tiger painting, Surprised! (Tiger in a Tropical Storm).

Pascale’s novel, My Hummingbird Father (Salt Publishing, 2024) will be available to buy at Bookbag on the night. A recent review of Pascale’s book can be found here: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/oct/24/my-hummingbird-father-by-pascale-petit-review-a-tale-of-childhood-trauma-takes-flight

Host or Publisher The Story Society, Bath Spa University