From the 'alleged' to the 'personal.'

Yesterday I had the honour of interviewing the remarkable author and activist Winnie M Li as part of the Murder One crime writing festival 2023, which took place away from the strangely balmy October weather (and the crowds of a bustling Dun Laoighaire), inside the cool auditorium of the DLR LexIcon. A fantastic library and cultural space (dare I venture to say - the best...?)

We had a really insightful chat in front of a great audience - delving into the wider issues around sexual assault and rape in our society, the long term impact of #MeToo, parallel lives and split identities, and power and privilege in the game between victim and attacker.

This morning, then, I came across a piece I had written for writing.ie in 2018, about my first novel, The Glass Door, and the similarities in theme were quite startling - about power and its abuses, and the perceived unreliability of the female mind.

Women’s stories are insular, subjective; so we are told. Their perception is caged, turned in like an ingrown hair, lacking the power or the reach to affect anything other than themselves. In cases like these where at one end of the scale is a powerful man with everything to lose and the other is a woman who has already lost almost everything, we repeatedly see concern tilt the scales in favour of possible consequences for the abuser....A man’s experience has influence, breadth; it is written into law, built into the foundations of cities. A woman’s is limited to the boundary of her skin.

​-R M Clarke, 'A Novel about Female Memory' for writing.ie

A strange crossover of time there - where five years collapse in an instant into one. Strange how things come around like that, reminding us that despite all efforts to the contrary, there's nothing linear about our lives.

You can read that article here.

Here are some lovely photos from the event for you to enjoy in the meantime.

(PS here's where you can buy The Glass Door!)

(And Winnie's fantastic books #DarkChapter and #Complicit)