Into Being: The Radical Craft of Memoir and its Power to Transform
(Hardback)
Publishing Details
Into Being: The Radical Craft of Memoir and its Power to Transform
By (Author) Lily Dunn
Manchester University Press
Manchester University Press
14th January 2026
United Kingdom
Classifications
General
Non Fiction
Memoirs
Physical Properties
Hardback
248
Width 138mm, Height 216mm
Description
The acclaimed author of Sins of My Father shares the secrets of writing a new, transformative kind of memoir.
Into being is an essential guide to writing memoir in a radical and empowering way. Drawing on her experience as a memoirist and a teacher of creative writing, Lily Dunn presents the ground-breaking idea that the craft of memoir itself can offer a form of transformation.
Dunn demystifies the memoirist's art, helping readers to find meaning in raw experience and elevate the personal to the universal. She considers intriguing questions, from why our memories give greater significance to certain events to how we can write honestly without intruding too far into the lives of our loved ones. She also explores how writers are extending the memoir form to create something hybrid, playful and subversive.
In an age of social media, filled with confessions, re-inventions and distortions of the self, the question of what it means to be an individual is more urgent than ever. Into being shows readers how to turn writing memoir into a journey of discovery one that can be shared with the whole world.
Reviews
A beautiful book: absorbing, propulsive, generous and humane, both in its honesty and in its willingness to share process.
Marina Benjamin, author of The Middlepause: On Turning Fifty
A profound examination of the value of memoir for both writer and reader, with practical advice on how to access emotionally meaningful events. Lily Dunns Into being is the essential guide to all things memoir.
Richard Beard, author of The Day That Went Missing
Author Bio
Lily Dunn is a memoirist, teacher and mentor. Her literary memoir Sins of My Father was published to great acclaim in 2022, being named a best nonfiction book of the year by the Guardian and the Spectator. She is also the author of Shadowing the Sun (2007) and co-editor of A Wild and Precious Life (2021). She is co-director of London Lit Lab and teaches creative writing at Bath Spa University.
