Winchester Books Festival
Alice Winn in conversation with Claire Fuller
In 1914, war feels far away to Henry Gaunt and Sidney Ellwood. They're too young to enlist, and anyway, Gaunt is fighting his own private battle - an all-consuming infatuation with the dreamy, poetic Ellwood - not having a clue that his best friend is in love with him, always has been.
When Gaunt's mother asks him to enlist in the British army to protect the family from anti-German attacks, he signs up immediately, relieved to escape his overwhelming feelings. But Ellwood and their classmates soon follow him into the horrors of trenches. Though Ellwood and Gaunt find fleeting moments of solace in one another, their friends are dying in front of them, and at any moment they could be next…
Alice and Claire will be discussing the themes of love and loss, brutality and beauty that feature so prominently in Alice’s book and how she came to write such an assured first novel.
About the author
Alice Winn
Alice Winn lives in Brooklyn, where she writes screenplays. She grew up in Paris and was educated in British boarding schools. She has a degree in English Literature from Oxford University. In Memoriam is her debut novel.
Photo by Jamie Ting
About the interviewer
Claire Fuller
Claire Fuller is the author of five novels. Her latest, The Memory of Animals was published in April 2023. Her previous, Unsettled Ground won the Costa Novel Award 2021 and was shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction. Her first, Our Endless Numbered Days won the 2015 Desmond Elliott Prize, her second, Swimming Lessons was shortlisted for the Encore prize, and her third, Bitter Orange was on the International Dublin Literary Award longlist. Her books have been translated into more than 20 languages.
"A tender, affecting debut… Winn strikingly evokes the torment and brutality of life of the front"
