Bidisha_online

Date: Tuesday 21st May, 5.15pm

Venue: John Snow Lecture Theatre Keppel Street London WC1E
Booking: Book Online

Speakers:

Prof Joy Lawn, Professor of Maternal Reproductive and Child Health Epidemiology, London School Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
Prof David Osrin, Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow in Clinical Science, UCL Institute for Global Health

With 1000 days remaining to the Millennium Development Goal targets, there is an increased focus on reducing maternal and newborn deaths through equitable coverage of life-saving interventions. Community-based strategies to improve maternal and newborn health are receiving policy attention, but there are a number of ways of thinking about them. They may be perceived as individual interventions, as a platform for many activities, or even as a distraction from health system building. An increasing number of studies and trials have been published which examine a range of approaches, yet sometimes the evidence is grouped as if all community-based maternal newborn care strategies were the same. What does the latest evidence show and what is actually being scaled up?

A related piece by me: Help the mother, help the child, secure the future: maternal health in India

The alumni of Harvard and Oxford Universities are delighted to invite you to a panel and networking event about big business and corporate social responsibility on Thursday 23rd May.

This event will offer the opportunity to hear how individuals are adding the human element back into corporate social responsibility and to exchange ideas about the differences we can make. We will explore the small steps which individuals within organisations are taking to initiate change at grass roots level and to positively impact the lives of people in the developing world - and on our doorstep.

Date: Thursday 23rd May
Time: 6.30pm for 7pm start. Panel discussion and Q&A from 7-8pm,
Following by drinks and networking.
Venue: Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, 65 Fleet Street, London EC4Y 1HS.
Ticket Price: £10 (£8 for Harvard Alumni Club and ‘Oxford 10’ members). As space is limited, places will be allocated on a first come first served basis.
Register online at www.hcuk.org. Harvard alumni can log in with their post Harvard details. All others can register online as non-alumni and proceed to events from there.

Panellists:

Ayesha Mustafa: Founder and Director, Fashion Compassion
Daniel Vennard: Global Sustainability Director Brands, MARS INC.
Peter Maxmin, UK Search Director, Microsoft
Paul Lomas, Partner, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
Maggie de Pree, Co-Founder, The Human Agency& Imaginals

First of all, please Bloomsbury can we have a UK edition of this book so British-based art lovers and readers needn't order from India and wait for shipping? Because I've just discovered a new, absolutely beautiful artist's tribute to Delhi, one of India's most historic, complex, vibrant and inspiring cities. Kavita Iyengar's Delhi: Old and New is a stunning edition of original, fiercely observed and intricately traced images of the city, at once delicate and utterly fresh. Iyengar's images give the reader a strong visual tour of Delhi, yet are themselves so crisp and classy that the book feels timeless, lifted out of the daily bustle of cosmopolitan life. It does so by focusing on representing multiple Delhis through the centuries, via those architectural and cityscaped parts that still remain, from ancient temples to mosques, forts, palaces, colonial buildings (thanks, chaps) and the "New New Delhi" of post-Independence India. In Delhi, Old and New the vast weight of history is here made both accessible and inexpressibly gorgeous.

Full cover spread - click to enlarge

This is a book for everyone who loves art, or loves India, or both. And for those who want more of the exquisite works, here's a privileged look:

All images by Kavita Iyengar

I am urging everyone to back a major new documentary by the brilliant film-maker Ivana Ivkovic Kelley, whose project Persephone Speaks focuses on the use of rape as a war strategy. The film follows a survivor's quest to shed light on the international community's failure to acknowledge the effects this crime has on women's lives, long after the war has ended. There are only 10 days left before the fundraising campaign is over.

The project is more timely than ever, given that global awareness of this issue is rising. It's also amazing to witness the power of film-making on global politics, with William Hague stating that his consciousness was raised by Angelina Jolie's hard-hitting 2012 film In The Land of Blood and Honey, which focuses on the issue. That feature was a sombre and extremely admirable fictionalisation of real events, strongly influenced by actual witness and testimony.

For readers who want to know more about the global issue of rape in war (although, I should add, rape and all forms of gendered sexual violence and gendered abuse are absolutely endemic in peacetime societies too, everywhere in the world, regardless of colour, class, religion, culture, language and hemisphere) then I strong recommend the Women Under Siege Project, which provide extremely gritty and exhaustive documentation, testimony and research. A trigger warning strongly applies.

Persephone Speaks shows a survivor tracing and confronting perpetrators, testifying to the reality and aftermath of rape and seeking formal justice in the international community and courts system. As Kelley says, she wishes to

...acknowledge the effects this crime has on women's lives, long after the war has ended. Females are nonstop targets during wartime, as demonstrated by the mass rapes implemented as a policy of genocide during the Bosnian war. Because this atrocity is grossly ignored by the international community and international tribunals, this film revisits one survivor, Bakira, who continues to fight for justice on behalf of others all over the world.

From her tiny smoke-filled office on the shrapnel-damaged outskirts of Sarajevo, to her monthly sojourns to the Hague, her goal is for perpetrators to be brought to justice. To this day, war rape survivors continue to join her group, finally sharing their stories with this woman who will ensure their testimonies are heard in the courts in Sarajevo or the Hague.

In many cases, the perpetrators are either awaiting trial or have been rewarded by the Serbian government for successfully running a "camp", often in the form of a promotion within the local police force. We have witnessed incidents of this same "reward" behavior in similar conflicts around the world. In situations such as these, many survivors have expressed anger, fear, and shock, especially when they see their attacker, years later, in high level positions or vacationing beside them on the Adriatic coast.

Bakira... sets out to find where the perpetrators, named in numerous testimonies, now live, subsequently providing this evidence to the Hague and other courts.

Kelley and her team have initiated a Kickstarter campaign to raise $12,000 which will enable the completion of Persephone Speaks by autumn so that it can hit the international film festival circuit when it debuts. More than $8,000 has already been pledged (disclosure: I pledged some after reading the Women's Views on News feature - Kelley is a stranger to me) but according to Kickstarter custom the full target must be reached, or nothing.

Please help. In the words of the director,

It is through projects such as these that light is shed on human rights issues. The continued treatment of women around the world, especially during times of conflict, needs to be heard through as many channels as possible. Unfortunately, war rape survivors are often seen as a problem, a by-product of war that needs to be swept under the rug. Our work will be done when the world comes together to ensure female victims of war are not forgotten and the perpetrators are brought to justice.

Be a part of making Persephone Speaks happen by becoming a backer here and showing your support on the documentary's Facebook page here.

You might also be interested in finding out about Women for Women International's March of Peace from 5th-12th July 2013, which follows a 120 km route through Bosnia and Herzegovina to Srebrenica - the exact route taken by refugees of the war.

Following my piece about maternal health in India, and in advance of the UCL symposium on community-based global maternal care next week, I wanted to focus on two smaller-scale success stories and examine what makes them work. Medecins Sans Frontieres has been working on two projects aimed at reducing women’s risk of death in childbirth in the Kabezi district in Burundiand the Bo district in Sierra Leone.

MSF has produced an analysis of the challenges and gains of its work in a report called Safe Delivery (link takes you to a short précis) which looks at their work in Kabezi since the 2006 start of the project, and in Bo since the MSF began running a hospital there in 2003.

Image taken for MSF by Sarah Elliott, showing a successful emergency
birth in Burundi - I love the woman's smile.

Both Sierra Leoneand Burundi are at a disadvantage when it comes to maternal care as their health infrastructures – along with much else – have broken down during and in the aftermath of civil war. The long effect of such breakage is a deficit of human, educational and practical resources: so medical facilities are needed, as are qualified healthcare workers, as are the systems to employ them in a sustainable way and the educational infrastructures required to train them. This is before we tackle the important issue of patients’ own access to healthcare and the importance of antenatal and postpartum care. All this requires investment, establishment, organisation and management. According to MSF Burundi has a national average of 800 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births, and Sierra Leone has a national average of 890 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. Sierra Leonehas the third-highest rate of maternal death, after Chadand Somalia. The main causes of maternal death are haemorrhage (25%), sepsis (15%), unsafe abortion (13% - and the report states clearly that “abortions need to be performed by skilled medical workers in a safe and hygienic environment”), hypertensive disorders like eclampsia and pre-eclampsia; and obstructed labour.

As the report – which can be read in full here - states,

Every year, some 287,000 women die from complications during pregnancy and childbirth. Most are young, active and healthy. And for every woman who dies, another 20 women suffer from chronic ill health or disability due to conditions such as obstetric fistula.*

Across the world, in every country and every population group, approximately 15 percent of pregnant women develop complications that are potentially life-threatening. But the fate of a pregnant woman is very much dictated by where she gives birth in the world. In fact, 99% of maternal deaths occur in poor countries, where – for many people – medical services are out of reach or simply unaffordable

Yet the local district projects to address this issue (serving a population of nearly 600,000 in Bo and just under 200,000 in Kabezi) have shown that the implementation of basic – or rather, obvious – measures has steeply reduced rates of maternal death. The report stresses that the problem is not a lack of “state of the art facilities” and demonstrates that the establishment of an ambulance system and the availability of emergency in-hospital emergency obstetric care, with trained staff and appropriate medical supplies, twenty-four hours a day, for free, have brought the Kabezi figures down to 74% less than the national level for Burundi and the Bo figures down to 61% less than the national level for Sierra Leone. In both cases the cost of providing such measures to the population for free is less than 2 Euros per head in Bo and a tiny bit over 3 Euros in Kabezi.

One of the UN Millennium Development Goals is to reduce maternal mortality (in comparison with figures from 1990) by 75% by 2015. Judging by the success of the two projects I’ve described above, extreme change is possible through the implementation of simple but profoundly important measures. As the report states,

A common assumption is that improving access to emergency obstetric care is too costly, but MSF’s experience shows that this need not be the case.

*Despite the triumphs of the two projects I’ve described above, in February of this year MSF released a press alert announcing that Burundi’s only free provider of treatment for obstetric fistula, which is caused by complications during childbirth, is under threat of close due to a lack of trained medical staff. The UrumuriCenter, in the city of Gitega, is run jointly by Burundi’s Ministry of Health and MSF and treatment is provided by foreign volunteer surgeons on short-time assignments.

Last week in Liverpool I was privileged to chair a panel about the international women’s movement called 50 Billion Shades of Feminism. One of my guests was the novelist, playwright, Southall Black Sisters activist and Guardian commentator Rahila Gupta. Gupta was a stranger, although obviously a political ally, so I have no vested interest in the splurge of praise and promotion that follows.

First, some background: Rahila Gupta’s book Enslaved: The New British Slavery is one of the most shocking and important works of topical investigation and testimony I’ve read. It uncovers the reality of modern-day slavery and (strongly gendered) abuse, violation and exploitation happening within the UK, tragically unnoticed and unlooked-for by the majority of people. As the publishers state powerfully,

They live amongst us, invisible, stripped of their passports and money, locked in cramped rooms, physically and psychologically abused. Britainis once again home to thousands of slaves - they reach our shores via unimaginably perilous crossings, are confined to horrendous working lives, and forgotten. Very few ever have a chance of talking about their appalling experiences. Rahila Gupta seeks out five slaves and persuades them to tell us their disturbing stories in this compelling and revealing book.

The testimonies include those of a pregnant very young girl from Sierra Leonewho is used in a London house as an imprisoned domestic worker, a trafficked Russian teenager forced into prostitution, a religiously devout Somalian woman forced to become a prostitute to survive and a young Punjabi woman in an abusive forced marriage. They are in a country they don’t know, whose language they might not know, unaware of their human rights or how to formally claim and defend those rights. They have been stripped of all rights by their abusers and live in fear of returning to the extreme poverty, sexual violence, war or persecution they experienced in their home countries, knowing that the gangs or individuals who trafficked and exploit them here will target (or threaten to target) them and their families there.

Rahila Gupta’s work in all fields has been about the importance of telling the truth exactly where people are too discomfited by reality to look or listen – and she does so in a way which is beautifully written, powerful, riveting and unforgettable. She co-scripted the film Provoked, which starred Aishwarya Rai and Miranda Richardson, and dealt with the case of an abused Asian woman who set her violent husband alight

When I heard that Gupta’s new play Don’t Wake Me: The Ballad of Nihal Armstrong was debuting in Londonand then moving on to Edinburgh I couldn’t let it pass without writing something.

Flyer for Don't Wake Me, which will be coming to The Cockpit in Central London
after selected dates at the Chickenshed in North London

Written by Gupta, directed by Guy Slater and starring Jaye Griffiths (who’s starred in Silent Witness, Coronation Street, Criminal Justice), Don’t Wake Me is based on real events. It’s about the power of a mother’s love and determination and of a baby boy’s incredible joy, wit and will, in the face of life’s obstacles and others’ cynicism. This is their story:

After a difficult conception Nihal’s arrival into the world is a terrifying ordeal for his mother. During a traumatic delivery, attended by ‘cold-eyed’ midwives, Nihal has to be pulled back from the brink of death. Three months on, the doctor tells her that her baby has cerebral palsy and will never learn how to walk, talk, read or write.
However, as Nihal grows, his mother recognises that inside his seemingly helpless body is a bright, sensitive, spirited boy. She is forced to wage battle with the system, a system unable to accept that flowers can bloom in a desert – triumphantly demonstrated when Nihal learns to communicate fluently in his own unique style
This is the intensely dramatic, moving story of a mother’s tireless battles against prejudice and ignorance and her inspiring victories in her struggle for her son’s rights. A story of loss, grief, and joy, leavened by Nihal's sense of humour and the heroic human spirit.

EVENT DETAILS:

Don’t Wake Me will be previewing at the Chickenshed Theatre in North London from 22nd May 2013 - 25 May 2013. For details click here.
It will then be on at the Cockpit Theatre in Central London from 3^rd June until 22^nd June 2013. For details click here.
The official press night for Don’t Wake Me will be at the Cockpit on Monday 3^rd June at 7pm. For press please contact Sue Amaradivakara on 1001sca@gmail.com
It will then be on at the Gilded Balloon in Edinburghduring the 2013 Edinburgh Fringe Festival from Monday 5 August - Sunday 25 August. For details click here.

Jaye Griffiths, who stars in Don't Wake Me. Behind her is an image
of Nihal Armstrong

The Nihal Armstrong Trust, set up in memory of Nihal, provides grants to families of children with cerebral palsy to enable them to purchase cutting edge equipment and services not funded by local authorities.

No good deed goes unpunished. That is the dark conclusion of Boyt’s brilliant tragicomedy of charitable intentions and damaged histories. Heroine Harriet Mansfield is a blousy woman of big emotions and large scale, strong in intention, rich in feeling, emphatic in speech, full-bodied both literally and spiritually. She wants to open a nursery in a poncy part of town and conjure up a perfect girlsworld of harvest baskets, under-fives woodworking sessions and dress-up games, far from the twinge of WiFi and the smell of crisps. Her desire is to be Dream Proxy Mommy to a cohort of privileged little girls who’ll remember the institution for the rest of their (consequently) happy lives. It does not take the godfather of psychoanalysis to work out that this is because she herself had an unhappy childhood, but the forensic way in which Boyt explores Harriet’s karmically restitutional urge is sheer genius.

Using money from an inheritance and wordlessly encouraged by her enigmatic shrink – Boyt is brilliant on the agonies of successful psychotherapy in the early pages of the novel – Harriet opens the nursery. It’s a success: to break even you only need half a dozen pupils if they’re all rich. Then stuff happens.

Though providing much delight, in both sincerely heart-warming and satirically keen ways, the nursery is not the locus of the meaningful action. That occurs on the periphery and concerns Harriet’s parents and brother. The crucial, toxic events of Harriet’s life actually happened in the past and it’s an indication of Boyt’s excellence that the reader, so caught up in the jolly romp of Harriet-the-schoolmistress, does not notice the foreboding elements encroaching from the outskirts until it’s too late.

The Small Hours, as the title indicates, is about what happens in the gaps between our survival strategies, the long nights when the nursery is not full of children, the weekends when Harriet’s professional acumen is unneeded, the intervals between lessons and the moments before and after grand endeavours. It explores the generational after-effects of abuse, the never-ending fractal of consequences, the way adults betray children – and, of course, the positive way in which damaged adults vow to nurture future generations.

And at the same time it’s really funny.

The psychological precision of this novel is breathtaking. Boyt’s greatest accomplishment is her creation of Harriet, an eccentric, humorous and perceptive adult who is humiliated by the cruelty of others yet whose own sincerity remains undiminished. Harriet understands her own pathology and sees herself as a wounded healer, a pained Pied Piper leading Holland Park’s children out of the darkness and into the light. Her striving nature, friendliness, energy, sensuality, emotional sensitivity and crushed yet accurate intelligence make her a heroine amongst children. Somehow, they can tell that she is benign. Yet her desire to give love overwhelms her more circumspect adult peers. She is not afraid of embarrassing herself and yet, funnily, this largeness of soul embarrasses others. And so it goes on in a never-ending loop of delicious comic irony.

Apart from the nice staff members at the nursery many of the adults in the Small Hours are spiritually ugly, emotionally mean and morally poor, particularly those who’ve benefited from the greatest financial privilege and exhibit the most outward stylishness. Being two-faced themselves, they mistrust Harriet’s transparency. She in turn is acutely aware of the way her grand candour makes the timid feel awkward and the asinine feel superior. And their perverted and agonising misinterpretation of her successfully makes her self-conscious and therefore ungainly.

Part of the clever pain of The Small Hours is watching Harriet ask plainly honest questions, offer love and seek answers only to have her wholesomeness met with irritation, contempt and aversion by those who are just as damaged yet far more defensive than she is. As I read the novel I kept thinking, Harriet thinks of herself as huge and desperate and clumsy. I bet, if I were to meet her, she would be the opposite. Harriet’s brother, an uptight tightwad, has projected his own trauma onto her; everything she does riles him, because he is riled by his own past, of which she is a reminder. Because he never shows his emotions, when she shows a tiny bit of hers they seem elephantine by comparison.

And I haven’t even started on the mother. Or the dad.

Finally, every sentence of this novel is at once a bitingly witty summation and a deadpan indictment of the brutality of life. If I quoted the sharpest bits I’d wind up reproducing the whole thing. I haven’t, deliberately. Go and buy it.

The Small Hours by Susie Boyt is published by Virago but why don't you go straight to Amazon instead?

To mark the 60th anniversary of the birth of British artist Helen Chadwick (born 18 May 1953, died 1996), Richard Saltoun Gallery proudly presents her first solo exhibition in London for 10 years.

Helen Chadwick photographed by Kippa Matthews with some of her
Piss Flowers pieces

Helen Chadwick was one of the most important British artists to emerge in the 1980s and in 1987, one of the first woman artists to be nominated for the Turner Prize. Chadwick's innovative and provocative use of a rich variety of materials, such as flesh, flowers, chocolate and fur, was hugely influential on a younger generation of British artists. Her strongly associative and visceral images were intended to question gender representation and the nature of desire.

Her influence on the YBAs, as much through her attitude as by her works, was cemented through her teaching posts at the Royal College of Art, Chelsea School of Art and the London Institute. Her sudden death in 1996 from heart failure stunned the art world and put an end to a prolific artist at the apex of her career. Read an informative obituary, from The Independent, by clicking here.

This exhibition presents a selection of photographs and sculptures from 1982-1994, with over 20 works on display. Throughout the two gallery spaces there will be key works such as Meat Abstracts 1989, Wreaths to Pleasure, 1992-3, Ego Geometria Sum, 1982-4, and Piss Flowers, 1991-92, among others. Piss Flowers (1991-92), is one of her most recognisable works where she cast the interior spaces left by her partner David Notarius and her, pissing in the snow. The work is both repulsive and beautiful, and it is this combination that typifies Chadwick's work: aesthetic beauty created out of an alliance of unconventional, often vile, materials.

Exhibition Dates: 20 May 2013 - 28 June 2013
Gallery Hours: Monday to Friday 10:00 am - 6:00 pm or by appointment
Nearest Tube: Oxford Circus
Gallery web site here

At the same time that Jacob's Island gallery have just put on an exhibition of contemporary artists' work about war, featuring 14 men and 0 women...

Tomorrow East London Fawcett (ELF) will be launching the results of the Art Audit, a year-long survey of the position of women in today's art world, at Calvert 22. The full results will be published on ELF'sAudit website tomorrow and the Guardian are running a story on the campaign tomorrow morning.

Join ELF at Calvert 22 for the launch of the Art Audit results
Friday 24th May 7 – 9pm, 22 Calvert Avenue, London, E2 7JP
For further press enquiries please contact press@eastlondonfawcett.org.uk

As part of Calvert 22’s ‘…How is it towardsthe east?’ programme, ELF have been invited to unveil the findings of their year-long campaign to examine the position of women within the contemporary London art world.

The Great East London Art Audit was launched by East London Fawcett (ELF) in the Spring of 2012. The intention of the campaign is to raise awareness of the gender imbalance that persists within London’s galleries, and to celebrate those women who are defying the statistics and the galleries that support them. The event on Friday 24th May will mark the culmination of a year’s worth of work from a dedicated team of volunteer campaigners, researchers and statisticians. The body of up-to-date statistics generated by the team will reflect the representation of women in today’s art world, and will hopefully provide an objective basis for future discourse on women in the arts.

The launch will form part of Calvert 22’s month-long exhibition and events programme comprising talks, workshops, screenings and new commissions. Fostering conversations on subjects such as how histories are written and recorded in print and on screen ‘…how is it towards the east?’ is partially an opportunity to critically examine modes of self-organisation within the arts. Over the past year, the audit campaign has demonstrated the power of self-motivation and campaigning that is both passionate and sensitive. With invitations to host events at Shoreditch House, the Zabludowicz Collection and Sprüth Magers amongst others, and a press campaign that has led to features in publications including Time Out and The Huffington Post, the campaign is illustrative of the impact of positive feminist campaigning today.

Following an introduction from ELF Arts Director Gemma Rolls-Bentley, the audit team will unveil and explain their results and offer a series of short presentations on what motivates ELF, how the campaign has been organised and what they hope to achieve by releasing these results. The informal structure of the evening will allow for an open dialogue around the findings of the Art Audit.

The event is free and open to all, please email events@eastlondonfawcett.org.uk to register.

Still from

‘Broken Hearts Requiem’, 2011

Phoebe Collings-James

Digital video, 3:37

East London Fawcett (ELF) is the East London branch of the Fawcett Society – the UK’s leading campaign for equality between women and men. ELF organises talks, parties, arts events, sporting activities and much more. In its varied and positive approach to equality, ELF is 21st century activism for women and men who believe in progress, and who want to be a part of an exciting and ever expanding network of diverse, interesting and culturally engaged individuals in East London. The group is open to all and membership is free.

The Calvert 22 Foundation was founded in 2009, and is dedicated to building cultural bridges between Russia, Eastern Europe, the former Soviet republics and the rest of the world. It seeks to foster dialogue and encourage a global reappraisal of the culture of this part of the world, independent of governmental dictates or commercial interests. This commitment to dialogue and cultural exchange across creative disciplines and national boundaries, from both within and outside the mainstream lies at the heart of all the Foundation’s partnerships and enterprises.

Further reading:

I am thrilled to announce a new alliance with an innovative, dynamic, truly international woman, Kelly Falconer, founder of the Asia Literary Agency, who will be representing my fiction and non-fiction book projects worldwide. More details will be released to the UK and international press next week but what I can say for now is that we have three fiction projects ready to go and many more in the works (or rather, boiling in my brain, or spilling out of countless Smythson Panamas, the most beautiful notebook in the world)... and I have a new cool ally to be inspired by and learn from. Check out this interview with Publishing Perspectives, or this very recent piece from Time Out Hong Kong or this coverage right here from Book Brunch. See what I mean? These days you go global or give up.

I must also announce that this blog will flatline for the timebeing, although I'll keep my appearances and biog pages up to date. I've enjoyed (by which I mean to say I really disliked and resented) contributing to this site in an unpaid, overworked, compulsive and futile fashion for two and a half years and must now step back "without a murmur and with the fortitude that religion alone can give," to quote from a tombstone I saw at Exeter Cathedral yesterday. The inscription was commemorating a woman who died at only 29 after a long and no doubt totally harrowing illness. My articles on the arts and culture, social justice and international affairs, along with my work on health and global development for the International Reporting Project, will appear in the Huffington Post (another new alliance which I am very happy to announce) and elsewhere.

I am thrilled to announce a new alliance with an innovative, dynamic, truly worldly woman, Kelly Falconer, founder of the Hong Kong-based but international Asia Literary Agency, who will be representing my fiction and non-fiction book projects worldwide. To find out more about Kelly Falconer check out this interview with Publishing Perspectives, or this very recent piece from Time Out Hong Kong or this coverage from Book Brunch. See what I mean? She's cool and she gets it: go global or give up.

I must also announce that the main page of this site will flatline for the timebeing, although I'll keep my appearances and biog pages up to date. I've enjoyed (by which I mean to say I really disliked and resented) contributing to this site in an unpaid, compulsive, repetitive and futile fashion for two and a half years. I now step back "without a murmur and with the fortitude that religion alone can give," to quote from a tombstone I saw at Exeter Cathedral yesterday.

I will focus now on journalism, presenting/chairing, broadcasting and books instead of personal blogging. My articles on the arts and culture, social justice and international affairs, along with my work on global development for the International Reporting Project, will appear in the Huffington Post (another new alliance which I am very happy to reveal) and elsewhere.

Updated 12th July 2013

My most recent book is the reportage Beyond the Wall: Writing a Path Through Palestine and my recent articles include the following:

Disclosure: I was made a trustee of the Booker Prize Foundation in spring 2013.

The judges of the 2013 Man Booker Prize have selected what I believe to be the most exciting longlist and shortlist in the prize’s history. Inclusive, innovative, wide-ranging in voice, structure, tone, form and setting, the 2013 Man Booker has embraced the realities of the changing outer world and the infinite possibilities of the art form and shown how each affects the other.

Suddenly, they’re down with the brown. They’re sisters. They’ve gone global. The result? A skilled, bright, fascinating selection that has drawn praise from all quarters.

EDIT: and here's the winner: Eleanor Catton, for her novel The Luminaries:

Photo taken at the 2013 Booker ceremony
15th October 2013

The judges have read without prejudice, with joy, without false distinctions, with heart, without slackening their critical judgement and with full capacity to be inspired, to be moved, to be affected and elevated. Their choices for 2013 are a tribute to the written word, through which we understand unspoken words, thoughts, feelings, motivations; and also to the fictional world, through which understand the real one. The judges’ 2013 Man Booker choices reflect a new reality in which stories and their telling, authors and their ideas, are global. The judges have recognised that even with great diversity of reference, author, context and character there is one unifying and universal force: the passion of readers.

The Booker was launched in 1969 and while its aim was to reward excellence in fiction, it was open to British, Irish, Commonwealth and Zimbabwean writers only.

The Man Booker Prize is stepping up and now joyfully seeks and celebrates the best of fiction written in English and published in the UK, starting with the 2014 prize - although the transformation has already begun, without our direction, in this year’s choices.

These ‘changes’ are nothing more than a vindication of the Man Booker’s original vision, properly fulfilled: to reward the best work of fiction in the English language. The nationality of the author is unimportant, as it should be: writers of all nationalities live all over the world and are inspired by that world, as are readers. The authors’ skill, their vision and their gifts in English literature are what matter, wherever they put pen to paper and whatever the view from their study window. This ‘expansion’ is nothing more than a recognition of great talent and one great work and an acknowledgement that talent in the English language is obviously not confined to Britain, Ireland, the Commonwealth and Zimbabwebut may be found anywhere.

The behind-the-scenes tweaks to the system have been more than eighteen months in the making and were developed with the full involvement of industry professionals, writers, readers, booksellers and many others. The number of judges and the fact that only UKpublishers can submit books are unchanged. However, the fear that judges will be overloaded with books has been considered and dealt with. There is a new system of submissions according to which publishers have had books longlisted within the previous five years. Of course, publishers who have had no previous longlistings are also able to make a submission. The convention of allowing all publishers to propose up to five further novels for judges to consider considering also stands, as does the judges’ privilege in calling in any book which has not been submitted but which they feel should be considered.

The new system is so rigorous, so mindfully conceived, so fair and with so many variables worked out to limit the burden on judges and ensure fairness for publishers that it resembles a cross between the notes for a massive multiplayer Mah Jong game and an early instruction leaflet for the world’s first abacus. So please trust them, but don’t ask me to explain it or I’ll fluff it and be off the Board of Trustees before you can say ‘impostor syndrome.’

Let me also point out that being asked to judge the ManBooker Prize is optional and is a joy. It’s not military service. My advice to judges who’ve been approached, but who don’t want to do it, is this: say no. Say no to the discussions, the books, the posh lunches, the increased social status, the networking opportunities, the discovery of new authors’ work, the new friends, the enhanced career standing, the connection to one of the most significant literary prizes in the world and the amazing party at the end. No problem. We’ll ask someone else.

There is very little chance that judges will be ‘swamped’ by all manner of stuff sent over in Jiffy bags from every Post Office in the world. Works will be submitted by the authors’ UKpublishers and the overall number of submissions will be balanced out by the new submissions system, so we do not expect an increase in the number of books judges must read. There are relatively few American authors published in the UKso there is no question of UKand Commonwealth authors who might otherwise be considered being squeezed out.

And now, having kept my diplomacy for a page and a half, it’s time to open a vein and spray some venom.

This is a discussion about literature, not a debate about immigration. This is great news about a prize rewarding literary excellence, not a committee discussing border controls. This is an interesting and joyful cultural shift, not a xenophobic, petty, stand-up knock-down election debate about outsiders or identity or dilution or being threatened by foreigners who are going to muscle in, warp ‘our’ image and take all ‘our’ jobs/prizes/power/whatever. Identity has always altered with context. Identity shifts, it expands, it accommodates and grows deeper according to the surrounding reality. This is not a dilution but a development; not a fundamental weakening but a positive evolution. And if the lurking fear, behind all the bluster, is that perhaps British and Commonwealth writers are not good enough to survive this new world with all its new voices, I say: what low self-esteem, what a boring inferiority complex. Get over it.

Whingeing, resistance and doom-mongering are natural human reactions to change. I must say, I am invigorated by this fauxtroversy because it shows that people are surprised. This venerable prize, this career-making boon, this rich-making establishment honour, The Man Booker Prize, is leading the debate. The rest of the industry and the media are now thinking, analysing, reacting, regrouping, reframing. Critics and snipers have a choice: embrace change or fear it; go with the future world or whinge at home in crabby insularity; welcome others with grace or ostracise them with bitterness; step up your game or get off the pitch; get with the programme or be left behind.

EDIT: As of 6th October 2013, John Greyson and Tarek Loubani have been freed.

This is a guest post on behalf of the campaign for John Greyson and Tarek Loubani, text (c) the campaign team.

Canadian filmmaker John Greyson and emergency room physician Tarek Loubani have informed friends and supporters through their Egyptian lawyers that they will be refusing food beginning September the 16th to protest the arbitrary nature of their detention by Egyptian authorities. A letter of protest and signed petition are currently being circulated to secure their release and the campaign web site is constantly being updated.

Greyson and Loubani were transiting through Cairo on their way to Gaza where Loubani was carrying out a medical aid project and Greyson was preparing for a film project. They have been detained in Cairo's Tora prison for the past 31 days. During that time, Egyptian officials have not provided any reason for the ongoing detention.

Greyson and Loubani's detention could be extended up to 2 years without formal charges being laid according to new emergency measures put in place in Egypt.

"We can only imagine the anguish that John and Tarek feel after realizing that their detention could be extended for so long in what can only be described as an arbitrary process that lacks any credibility," said campaigner Cecilia Greyson. "We know that they did not take the decision to begin a hunger strike lightly, and we want them to know we will do everything we can to support them and get them home soon," she added.

"We have been overwhelmed by all of the support we have received in our campaign to bring Tarek and John back home," said campaigner Mohammed Loubani. "We are also grateful to the many Department of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade (DFATD) employees, and consular officials who have worked so tirelessly to make sure Tarek and John stay safe and are returned to us as soon as possible," he added.

"We also want to thank Prime Minister Harper, Minister Baird, and Minister Yelich for advocating for John and Tarek's release at the highest levels of the Egyptian Government," said Mohammd Loubani. "We are especially looking forward to the results of discussions with the Egyptian Prime Minister, Mr. Hazem El-Beblawi; Deputy Prime Minister, Gen. Abdul-Fatah Al-Sisi; and Minister of Interior, Mr. Mohamed Ibrahim about John and Tarek's ongoing detention," he added.

A Change.org petition calling for the release of the two Canadians has received 115,000 signatures to date. In addition, 311 prominent cultural and academic figures have signed a letter calling for John and Tarek's release. Among the signatories are Alec Baldwin, Alex Gibney, Arundhati Roy, Atom Egoyan, Ben Affleck, Charlize Theron, Danny Glover, Sarah Polley, Naomi Klein and Michael Ondaatje

Amnesty International has issued an urgent action about Tarek and John, asking for letters and phone calls directly to Interim President Adly Mahmoud Mansour, Minister of Defence General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Public Prosecutor Hesham Mohamed Zaki Barakat.

Supporters of Tarek and John will be gathering at the Egyptian Consulate in Montreal at 1pm on Tuesday September 24. "The Egyptian authorities seem to be sending the message that Egypt is not a safe place to travel to, that if you go there, you can be jailed for a long time and with no recourse," said campaigner Justin Podur. "We want to send the message that we will not forget our friends, and we will not settle for anything less than their immediate release."

As the term of the current Millennium Development Goals reaches an end in 2015, healthcare workers and reporters worldwide are assessing the efficacy of different global health and development approaches over the last few years. The necessity of improving global health has been one of the highest priorities of development practitioners and activists, the touchstone being universal access and free access.

One project study, which aimed to provide free treatment for tuberculosis patients in Burkina Faso, caught my eye because it illustrates the subtle challenges and difficulties (as well as areas of success) which arise when it comes to the practicalities of delivering healthcare which is intended to be both free and universal. The findings of the research will be vital in shaping world healthcare policies when it comes to the treatment, control and prevention of TB after the timeframe of the current Development Goals.

Based on meticulous year-long research by Samia Laokri, Olivier Weil, K Maxime Drabo, S Mathurin Dembelé, Benoît Kafando & Bruno Dujardin, the study - an abstract is provided here by the World Health Organisation - demonstrates the flaws of a generalised or sweeping analysis, starting with the "theory [that] the removal of user fees puts health services within reach of everyone, including the very poor." They warn,

In the poorer countries of the world, where most people live on less than US$ 2 per day and expenditure on health care can plunge patients and their families into extreme poverty, the removal of user fees for health is seen as a matter of real urgency. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to be enough to ensure truly universal coverage.

A full version of the report is here and I have provided my overview and analysis below.

The study I'm focusing on, which is part of a larger project [see points seven and eight here], is based on the findings of rounds of interviews with 242 patients who tested positive for pulmonary tuberculosis across the six rural districts of Bousse, Koupela, Ouargaye, Zabre, Ziniare and Zorgho and who were enrolled in the national TB control programme. As the writers state,

The median direct costs associated with tuberculosis were estimated at 101 United States dollars (US$) per patient. These costs represented 23% of the mean annual income of a patient’s household. During the course of their care, three quarters of the interviewed patients apparently faced “catastrophic” health expenditure.

Their analysis of the cause of this US$101 direct cost is interesting: around US$ 45 of the cost was not down to the inherent cost of the medicines or treatments themselves, but to failures in the broader health system and policies; the researchers cites access, medical consultations, out of pocket expenses, unofficial payments to medical professionals and lost wages from their day jobs for both diagnosis and treatment (or even redundancy due to repeated absence). While individual patients bore these costs by strategising. economising and accommodating within their households and negotiating or receiving community and extended-family support, this accommodation weakened their overall economic standing and jeopardised their position in the long term. There was a likelihood of established savings being used, of families being forced to decrease consumption to save money, being forced into the sale of goods or services to raise money or to take out loans to raise money. When this seemingly small monetary figure accounts for nearly a quarter of each household's income, given the generalised socio-economic context of poverty or near-poverty amongst the population studied, there are grave consequences in terms of increased social inequality and economic instability; the stigma of suffering from TB; the 'social debt' incurred by help received by family members and the wider community; and a greater improbability of proper treatment being sought, for all these reasons. The illness itself increased instability, with the researchers citing an average loss of 45 days of work lost by sufferers across the research year from 2007 to 2008.

The 23% percentage figure of annual income cited for TB treatment costs is alarming as the threshold for a definition of "catastrophic" expenditure which represents an excessive burden on a patient or their household in the rural low-income communities in the study, is 10%. The study analysed all the types of expenses and costs, including non-medical and non-financial costs, which arose as a result of suffering, diagnosis and treatment and identified various failures and weaknesses in the system. They include necessary services that were not covered by the free treatment package (which include diagnosis by spit sample, anti TB drugs and repeat smears to determine treatment outcome) and services that were not necessary but where payment was required. The report states,

Only 2% of the patients interviewed...reported that they had received completely free tuberculosis care.

The challenges above, as well as other failures in patient treatment (such as extended time periods required for diagnosis and repeat procedures) explain why the rates of TB detection and cure are lower than might be hoped given the MDG and the adoption of international recommendations for TB control. The researchers state that what are necessary are solutions which pull in all practitioners, "political decision-makers, managers of health programmes and health services" to develop meaningful responses and suggest a number of measures including the decentralisation of diagnosis and treatment so that patients do not have to travel, improving community care to enable early detection, help for the poorest households, supporting healthcare providers and also supporting patients not just financially but socially and psychologically through dialogue with former patients. They also call for a rigorous assessment of 'free' healthcare systems with a multilayered analysis of economic and social consequences aimed at fine-tuning policy, identifying and rectifying faults in the system, guaranteeing efficiency and helping (rather than exploiting or exacerbating the problems of) the most vulnerable.

Bidisha is a 2013 Fellow for the International Reporting Project. She is reporting on issues of global health and development.

Nineties Woman is a new show from award-winning comedian Rosie Wilby, tracing a journey through early 90s feminism, refracted through a very personal lens. It's a Time Out Critics choice (19/3/12) and has been covered by the Telegraph under the charming title, What Happens When Militant Student Feminists Grow Up (er - we become militant thirtystomethings and then middle-aged militants with mortgages, then menopausal militants?)

Starting with her treasured old copies of Matrix (Greek for ‘womb’), the newspaper that she and a collective of women set up at York University in 1990, Rosie peeks through a kaleidoscope of cultural history and personal activism including poll tax riots, Reclaim The Night rallies, political lesbianism and same sex wedding demos and wonders how on earth we ended up with ‘Girl Power’? Was she partly to blame when she put a frivolous ‘Celebrate Women’ cartoon on the cover of Matrix instead of a Rape Crisis logo, in the vain hope that more people might pick up it and read their articles about body image, sexual harassment, domestic violence and eating disorders. Or when, during her tenure as Student’s Union Women’s Officer, she dressed up as Kylie Minogue for a publicity stunt. See a clip of her performing below:

Channeling a riot grrl-like DIY energy, the Matrix collective would cut and glue an issue together each month – once daubing a wall with splendid green and purple ‘Sisterhood is Powerful’ graffiti on a guerilla midnight mission just for the cover photo. In this funny and moving show, part documentary, part detective story and part unrequited love story, Rosie traces this original collective and investigates what happened to feminism (and the woman that everyone had a crush on).

Twenty years on, the Matrix women have diversified into all kinds of work – some have remained in journalism, others are authors, academics and playwright/poets, one a clinical embryologist and another a former barrister now running a successful vintage hair company styling hair on film sets and more. View the trailer for Nineties Woman below:

Says Rosie,

“I started reading books and articles by some of the younger feminists coming through, like Kat Banyard, and started wondering again about Matrix - what our legacy had been, whether it was still going and what my fellow writers were doing these days. I found my dusty old copies up at my Dad’s among all my old stuff and, once I started reading them again, found myself on a detective mission to find out. It turns out a later group of York students started up a new feminist zine, Matrix Reloaded, in 2006. They were still featuring a lot of the same issues which, in some ways is frustrating as it demonstrates that we haven’t come very far over the last 2 decades, but it was great to meet them and know we’d inspired them to create something. That meeting wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t started making this show.”

The F Word have said it's hilarious, the Planet London said it was witty, empathetically nostalgic and incredibly well-narrated and some other net outlet said it is a joy of a play.

Nineties Woman was commissioned by Shout LGBT Festival at Mac in Birmingham in March 2013 and is supported using public funding by Arts Council England. Creation of the piece was supported by: Ben Walters, Time Out London’s cabaret editor; Naomi Paxton, actress, character comedian and writer (The Methuen Drama Book of Suffrage Plays); and Colin Watkeys, director of several internationally touring shows with performer Claire Dowie.

Upcoming dates are as follows:

19 Oct 2013 – Women in Comedy Festival, Manchester
1 Nov 2013 – Calm Down Dear Festival, Camden People’s Theatre
17 Nov 2013 - Outburst Festival, Belfast
21 Feb 2014 - Rich Mix, London
21 March 2014 - Burton Taylor Studio, Oxford Playhouse
29 March 2014 - The Courtyard, Hereford

NOTES FOR EDITORS:

Rosie Wilby is available for authored pieces and for interview. For hi res pics, press tickets or interview requests, please contact Liz Hyder on liz@lizhyder.co.uk or on Twitter @LondonBessie

Rosie has appeared on BBC Radio 4’s Loose Ends, Summer Nights, Midweek and Woman’s Hour, LBC and BBC London and at festivals including Glastonbury, Green Man, Larmer Tree and Latitude. She was a finalist at Funny Women 2006 and Leicester Mercury Comedian of the Year 2007. Her 2009 show The Science Of Sex won a Fringe Report Award, was a sell-out at Cambridge Comedy Festival, Cambridge Science Festival, Manchester Science Festival, Camden Fringe and Liverpool Comedy Festival and was been selected for Fresh Fruit Festival in New York City July 2013. Her 2011 show Rosie’s Pop Diary, later to become How (not) To Make It In Britpop, toured nationally to critical acclaim and she has appeared at WOW (Women of the World) Festival and Polari Literary Salon at London’s Southbank Centre. For Edinburgh 2013, she took a brand new show Is Monogamy Dead? to Assembly venues. Her writing has been published in The Guardian, The Independent, Time Out, Diva and more and she features in a new anthology published by Little Episodes.

text (c) Rosie Wilby/Nineties Woman team.

Turquoise Mountain Institute, polishing

Even when the international news about Afghanistan tends to look like this and an ordinary person like me yearns to kiss off the English glass ceiling and join the Revolutionary Association of Women of Afghanistan to fight for emancipation, sometimes all it takes is a bit of bling to dazzle me back to centre. No need to fight the Taliban face to face and go into politics or die trying– I can express my solidarity from here and clock some bejangle in the run-up to Christmas.

If you want to feel that even in an uncertain world there’s still craft and joy and beauty, go to The British Council’s Gem: Contemporary Jewellery and Gemstones from Afghanistan, an exhibition of jewellery, gem-cutting and contemporary practices, which will go on show at the British Council’s London headquarters on 8th October.

Curated by Melanie Eddy, the show explores the process and traditions behind gem-cutting in Afghanistan and examines how these techniques are applied to contemporary jewellery. The display is the result of a long collaboration with Turquoise Mountain, an Afghanistan-based organisation which promotes Afghan craft and design worldwide. On display will be specially commissioned jewellery created by Afghan artisans alongside pieces of contemporary jewellery by UK designers including Pippa Small, Hattie Rickards, Vicki Sarge and Melanie Eddy.

Turquoise Mountain Institute, polishing lapis

Now I’m in the world of the great and the good (local community MBE, here we come), I have to give my official line on anything I write about, so let’s be clear. I’m pro the British Council, despite a great rumour someone told me once – “You know those white chaps in blue prinstripe suits are all MI6? It’s the way they can walk into any embassy in the world with absolute ease and no-one stops them.” I couldn’t possibly comment. I’m in favour of the British Council's cultural diplomacy, of cordial and creative international relations and in particular of long term, empowered and remunerated artistic collaboration which nurtures talent and supports careers. It's invaluable; the British Council has created meaningful international opportunities culturally, educationally and socially.

As John Mitchell, Director, British Council Afghanistan, says:

This exhibition shows how through residencies, skills development and the exchange of ideas, Afghan jewellery design and manufacture has been both restored and enriched. This has led sustainable economic development and improved prospects and livelihoods. Gem also illustrates how UK – Afghan collaboration has helped inform UK jewellery design. Internationally renowned British jewellers have been inspired by Afghan design, processes and gemstones to develop new, innovative products which reflect the best of our creative industries.

The exhibition brings to life the personal stories of the jewellery makers and gem cutters, exploring, as the organisers say, “how arts and culture can contribute to the rebuilding of a post conflict country.”

Let’s say nothing wincingly over-specific about where that conflict came from and who supported it, because no euphemism could possibly cover it. But who cares about global military alliances, arrogant Western occupation, colonial notions of liberation and conquer, failed and expensive wars and special relationships turned rotten when you can admire the beautiful and exquisitely made things on display?

Oculus ring by Hattie Richards

Silver filigree earrings by Monawer Shah Qodusi

The exhibition will also feature gems in their uncut forms, maps of their origins in Afghanistan and tools of the gem-cutting trade as well as a short film by Afghan filmmaker Jawed Taiman which will document the making process.

...and, soldering

The exhibition is a flagship event of the British Council’s new UK-South Asia season, a programme which will be running throughout autumn 2013 to celebrate and explore the cultural relationship between the UK and South Asia. The season includes the premier of The Djinns of Eidgah, a new play by Abhishek Majumbar; a discussion about the role of press reporting on India/Pakistan; a celebration of Bengali literature; a discussion about Indian epic literature; a celebration of the inspiring cities of Kolkata, Mumbai and Karachi and more.

...and shellac

While I love the range of issues up for discussion and the intelligent and engaged approach, looking at the participants namechecked in the speaking events which are not invitation-only, they are more than 80% male. Now you know and I know that the audiences, the producers, the PRs, the supporters and the administrators are 70% female, so all the labour and investment is going one way and all the benefits are going the other way. This is happening in the same month that the publishers Frances Lincoln produced an anthology spanning 244 British writers, 500 years and 600 pages, curated by two young English chaps who kept women at 19.5%, proving that sexist discrimination really is colourblind.

In the British Council's invite-only events roster there is one gender panel where they stick some women. The session's called 'The changing shape of gender equality in South Asia; shifts, challenges and a new global partnership.' So far, the season organisers have stuck very faithfully to the 'gender shape' that's always been there and have not challenged it or shifted it in any way, but have patriarchally done what has always been done, by massively marginalising women and keeping us at 22% or less.

Anyway, the gem exhibition looks fantastic and the design work has integrity (hipsterspeak for it's not just tat). What an irony - and yet how typical - that the majority of the Afghan makers shown straining their eyes and fingers to create something very beautiful for not that much money are women, yet when it comes to kicking back, being invited onto a lovely discussion panel, being worshipped as an intellectual and talking about broad issues, cultural shifts, global relations and creative challenges women are pushed to the margins and dropped off the edge. But we can wear lovely necklaces as we fall.

Turquoise Mountain Institute
Works in progress

Gem: Contemporary Jewellery and Gemstones from Afghanistan:

8th October – 29th November 2013
10am – 4pm Monday to Saturday
British Council, 10 Spring Gardens, London, SW1A 2BN

For more information about the exhibition or the British Council’s South Asia season click right here or right here.

All photos and press release text (c) British Council except my obvious interjections.

Off the back of my discovery of the brilliant sites The Prostitution Experience and The Invisible Men, which put the responsibility, questions and scrutiny back on men who think it's okay to buy women...

At 7pm on 14th October at Amnesty International's UK headquarters in London MP Fiona Mactaggart, author Kat Banyard, campaigner Ruth Jacobs and Cheryl Stafford, Exiting Prostitution and Internal Anti-Trafficking Advocate at Eaves for Women, will be part of a panel discussing the decriminalisation of prostitution following the premiere of Honest Lies:

Honest Lies is an 11-minute film based on a story written by a woman previously involved in prostitution during volunteer-led workshops. The screening will be followed by a discussion about how to support women exiting prostitution, and the need for a change in legislation that will decriminalise the sale of sex, and criminalise its purchase. This is known as the Nordic model: a set of laws that penalises the demand for commercial sex while decriminalzing individuals in prostitution based on an approach first adopted in Sweden in 1999, followed by Norway and Iceland. The Nordic model has two main goals: to curb the demand for commercial sex that fuels sex trafficking, and promote equality between men and women.

To purchase tickets, please click here.

On 20th September 2013, the UN’s Global Commission on HIV and the Law announced they were considering calls for countries to "repeal laws that prohibit consenting adults to buy or sell sex" and that ban "immoral earnings" and brothel-keeping, and also demands measures "to ensure safe conditions for sex workers". These announcements were met with horror from support organisations who are petitioning the UN to listen to survivors.

All panellists will be available for interview at the event and there will be a Q&A discussion.

Fiona Mactaggart MP (Slough) campaigned successfully for the law to be amended so that anyone paying for sex from those they know to be trafficked is criminalised, said:

At the moment, Britain’s prostitution laws target women who are trapped in prostitution, often by pimps or because of addiction, and the men who use those women don’t face any consequences for their behaviour. It’s time we did more to help women build a new life and exit prostitution instead of punishing them.

Ruth Jacobs, author and campaigner whose website provides a forum for survivors to share their stories, is also appearing on BBC1’s Inside Out programme on 21st October talking about the Merseyside model of policing. The Merseyside model refers to the Merseyside Police Force's pledge in 2006 to treat crimes against people in prostitution as hate crimes. The hate crime model has had outstanding results. In Liverpool, in 2009, police convicted 90% of those reported to have raped sex workers. In 2010, the overall conviction rate in Merseyside for crimes against sex workers was 84%, with a 67% conviction rate for rape. The national average conviction rate for rape is 6.5%. The event on 14th Octoberwill be the first time that Ruth will speak publicly about her status as a survivor of prostitution.

Gabriella Apicella, producer of Honest Lies, will chair the panel. Having run writing workshops at Eaves for the past 18 months, she ran a Kickstarter crowd-funding campaign to 100% finance the making of the film, and adapted the story for the screen. She said:

I made this film because the women I have been working with told me nobody cares about their stories. Not only did I intend to disprove that, but I also believe that the stories of survivors of prostitution can facilitate a change in the law. Those who have been prostituted must be decriminalised, and the purchase of sex punished by law, as an expression by society that human beings are not commodities.

Kat Banyard, author of The Equality Illusion and founder of grassroots activism organisation UK Feminista is also on the panel, along with with Cheryl Stafford, Exiting Prostitution and Internal Anti-Trafficking Advocate at Eaves for Women.

Cheryl Stafford facilitated the writing workshops that the original story of “Honest Lies” came from. Eaves for Women is a charity organisation that supports women who have experienced violence. Specialised projects support women exiting prostitution, trafficked women, survivors of sexual abuse, rape and domestic violence. In 2013 The Scarlet Centre, a women-only drop-in facility where the writing classes in which “Honest Lies” was conceived were initially based, closed due to a cut in funding. Only volunteer-led activities continue to take place, each at the discretion of those who contribute their time.

To purchase tickets please click here.

For more information or to reserve a press ticket contact info@gabriellaapicella.com

Text (c) Honest Lies project and Gabriella Apicella

Hyeonseo Lee, whose memoir will
be published in Autumn 2014

Hyeonseo Lee escaped the North Korean regime. Later, she risked her life to return and rescue her mother and brother. Her memoir of these events has now been acquired by Arabella Pike, Publishing Director at William Collins UK, in a six-figure deal following a hotly contested auction among numerous publishing houses bidding for the rights. Arabella Pike says that the book “has electrified everyone here …and in our US office.” She describes it as “powerful, deeply emotional and important” and adds that Hyeonseo Lee “will be, I believe, the first eyewitness female writer to describe the terrifying fates of North Korean women escapees in China.”

The deal was brokered by Kelly Falconer of the Asia Literary Agency, based in Hong Kong. And that’s why Kelly’s my agent. She comments,

This is the story not only of Hyeonseo's escape - literally from the darkness into the light - but also of her coming of age, of her "re-education", of her ability to successfully rebuild her life not once but twice, first in China, then in South Korea, which proved to be the more difficult of the two. Thousands of refugees and escapees pour out of North Korea but thousands also struggle to adapt, and rarely do they thrive, as Hyeonseo Lee has.

The book is due to be published in Autumn 2014. Danish, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish rights have been sold at various auctions by Pontas Literary Agency, acting on behalf of the Asia Literary Agency, with other offers currently under consideration.

Buzz about Hyeonseo Lee has been building for months following her TED talk, which detailed her escape from North Korea and has gathered over 2 million views online. It is viewable here:

As a child, Hyeonseo Lee thought her country was ‘the best on the planet’. It wasn't until the devastating famine of the 1990s that she began to question what she had been taught. She escaped to China when she was 14 and began a life in hiding as an illegal alien. The book, as yet untitled, will describe her privileged childhood in North Korea, her life in China, her decision to settle eventually in South Korea and her journey back to North Korea to rescue her mother and brother. She is now at university in South Korea and is a human-rights advocate and spokesperson for the North Korean refugee community.

Selected further reading about North Korea

Barbara Demick, Nothing To Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea
North Korean defector, Kim Young Soon, reveals conditions inside state's concentration camps (Huffington Post)
Out of a hidden place: two new books, one personal, one political, let daylight into the hidden kingdom of North Korea (Economist)
North Korean memoir tests South's interest in refugee stories (Wall Street Journal)
North Korean 'court poet' to publish memoir (Guardian)
Four memoirs portraying the realities of modern day North Korea (Mapping Worlds)

Press release text (c) Flatcap Asia, with thanks to Kelly Falconer for exclusive quote.

Symposium on Community-Based Maternal and Newborn Care at UCL

"Putting the Soul Back into Business: Small Steps – Big Impact." Big brains. Pretty major privilege too actually.

Tracing the inkline of beauty and history: Delhi Old And New by Kavita Iyengar

Persephone Speaks: The forgotten women of Bosnia

The power of simplicity: reducing maternal mortality in districts in Sierra Leone and Burundi

Don't Wake Me: the powerful new play by Rahila Gupta

Laugh ‘til you cry, cry ‘til you laugh: The Small Hours by Susie Boyt

Helen Chadwick: Works From The Estate

Art women, art discrimination, art resistance at Calvert 22.

Watch this global space

Random Non Hipster Photo Diary part gazillion

Watch this global space

Latest

The Man Booker, Raised and Transformed: In Celebration Of A Prize for the 21st Century World

Canadians detained without charge in Egypt go on hunger strike in protest

When free universal healthcare isn't free and isn't universal: a case study in TB treatment from Burkina Faso

Comedian Rosie Wilby: Nineties Woman, 21st Century Wit

What’s Pashto for ‘fabulous?’ A new contemporary jewellery exhibition showcases the work of Afghan artisans

Men who rent and use women: film premiere of Honest Lies and debate about change in prostitution laws

Hyeonseo Lee’s North Korean escape and rescue memoir gains six figure book deal