North London Food & Culture

Review: Memoirs of Mothers

This frank discussion between authors Michele Hanson and Elisa Segrave was one of the highlights of ArchWay With Words, says Jack Watts

“You can’t really tell what you think of them when they’re alive.” Michele Hanson.
“You can’t really tell what you think of them when they’re alive.” Michele Hanson. Photo: MH

It’s been running now for nearly a fortnight, and on Tuesday evening the ArchWay with Words festival continued with an evening of recollections of growing up in the post-war years.

Local authors Michele Hanson and Elisa Segrave, in their recent books, have unravelled some of the mysteries of their own lives by solving those of their mothers.

As they explained, hushed conversations overheard as children, withheld to protect the youngster, only become understood in later life. Indeed, Hanson’s book is brilliantly and innocently titled What the Grown Ups Were Doing.

Hanson argues that in the youthful torrent of parents’ secrecy and the offspring’s own self-obsession, it can become difficult to form an accurate and rounded impression of your mother or father: “You can’t really tell what you think of them when they’re alive,” she said.


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It was a sad truth for the authors, therefore, that when the time came that they had the most questions to ask their parents, they were no longer around to answer them.

How pleasing, then, for Hanson and Segrave to have discovered so much after they passed away and to share these revelations with the world – and us this evening.

Guardian columnist (and occasional Kentishtowner contributor) Hanson was an instantly likeable and a proficient raconteur – and had the audience in raptures at points with her absurd reminiscences of her Jewish mother and of Ruislip in the ‘50s.

Tales of prostitution and infidelity were rife, while Segrave’s mother’s story was similarly filled with debauchery and sexual liberation.

It might seem peculiar for the younger members of the audience to note that all of this took place in an unimaginable world when women struggled greatly to express themselves, slaves to contemporary patriarchal society. As Hanson vividly recounts, her mother had no outlet “apart from cooking and screeching.”

Still, these women worked hard, constantly proving their unwavering loyalty not only to their patronising husbands but to their country (Segrave’s mother worked at Bletchley Park – and remained tight-lipped about goings-on there until her death).

Later on, the evening developed into a full-scale discussion between both authors and the audience, with much entertaining deliberation and pondering over questions.

Overall then? Memoirs of Mothers was an inspiring exploration of the impermanence of life, the changing nature of society, and, above all, a testament to the importance of enjoying the company of relatives – and, for that matter, anyone we love – while they are still with us.

ArchWay With Words continues tonight and finishes tomorrow with their new infamous Wuthering Heights flashmob in the mall, at 7pm. Find out more about it here

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