Many writers want to tell the story of who they are and the people and places that shaped them. But what does this story say about the wider world that can draw readers in? How do you tell a story that involves the lives of others, such as family members or friends, who may perceive or interpret events differently than you? Who does the story belong to? Is it yours to tell? And why now?

In this Writers’ Room workshop, journalist and writer Marisa Bate grapples with the questions at the heart of memoir writing. Her memoir, And Still We March, was inspired by discovering a Polaroid of her mother as a young woman on an American road trip in 1974.  Exactly 50 years later, Marisa recreated this trip to understand both who her mother was in the picture and how life had shaped the woman she became. From coming of age in Essex during the women’s lib movement to single motherhood under Thatcher’s Britain, Marisa explored not only her mother’s journey of triumph over misogyny but the story of women’s rights for the last half-century.

Marisa will discuss the source materials available and how to find them, how she pieced together her mother’s story, the different ways of researching the historical context and politics of the time, and give some tips on how to incorporate this into your own narrative – asking, who has the right to tell a story?

Marisa Bate was the first member of staff at the Webby-winning The Pool and has built a respected name as a feminist journalist, writing for, amongst others, the Guardian, The Times, The Telegraph, the i Paper, the Independent, Glamour, Marie Claire, Cosmopolitan, Grazia, Stylist, and Vogue.co.uk. She is the author of And Still We March (HQ, 2023) and The Periodic Table of Feminism (Ebury, 2018), which was published in the US by Seal Press and included in Bustle’s best books of the year.  Marisa is a regular commentator on feminist issues, with appearances across TV and radio and writes a popular newsletter on feminism and motherhood called Writing About Women. Marisa holds an MA in Twentieth-Century Literature from Goldsmiths, London.