ADULT LEARNING RESOURCES
Memory Maps
Memory Maps is about people and their relationship with place. It is about objects that are associated with particular areas as well as prints and paintings of named locations. But most importantly it is about writing about place.
In recent years a new form of writing has emerged drawing on fiction, history, conversation and memoir. The site includes contributions in the genre from contemporary writers such as Iain Sinclair and Lisa Appignanesi and it also includes opportunities for visitors to send in their own writing for publication on the site.
The Memory Maps website is a collaboration between Marina Warner, Professor of Creative Writing and her department at the University of Essex and the V&A. For this reason we have started by focusing on Essex.
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What Are Memory Maps? Marina Warner
In many ways, Memory Maps seeks to become a kind of installation- a work made of pictures and stories arising from memories of certain places and things and gathered from myriad sources.
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Contemporary Writing on Essex
Memory Maps asked leading contemporary writers to begin the process. They have responded to different works and images in a range of media. They are now posted here to inspire you, visitors to the site, to start making your own memory maps.
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Essex Trails
For walkers and cyclists or for anyone exploring Essex by car here are some trails to guide you round the Essex landscape and to help you gain a sense of place.
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Memory Maps: Selected Paintings & Drawings
This database of paintings and drawings forms part of the Memory Maps project, and currently represents many works from the Museum's collection depicting places and activities in Essex & Suffolk.
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Objects connected to Essex
This selection of objects from the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum have a range of connections with Essex and its history, sometimes of a very unexpected nature. -
Essex University Creative Writing Course
The Memory Maps MA course will encourage students to explore this newly resurgent form of writing. While exploring works that have affinities with this form, the course would not be constrained by it and would involve poets and songwriters, as well as prose writers.
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How to Get Involved
We are inviting you to contribute your own writings, photographs, and images, in response to the materials about Essex on the site. These will be selected for posting on the site, and the Memory Map will grow as you contribute.
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Historical Writing about Essex
A small selection of historical texts connected to Essex.
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Writers and Books connected with Essex
A selection of books to inform and inspire accompanied by the Memory Maps Course Reading List
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Weblinks to museums in Essex, Suffolk & Middlesex