Buy a copy from your local bookshop – perhaps Daunt books or another independent shop

Marina’s new book, Sanctuary: Ways of Telling, Ways of Dwelling is out! She has received some review, which you can read more about, alongside more on the book, on this page

Helen Chadwick: Life Pleasures, Exhibition at the Hepworth Wakefield, 17 May – 27 October 2025

Marina has contributed to the exhibition catalogue for the upcoming exhibition of Helen Chadwick’s work at the Hepworth Wakefield. A recent work by Marina also related to Chadwick may be of interest to those visiting the exhibition – Helen Chadwick: The Oval Court

This major retrospective will be the first in over 25 years, and will chart the development of Chadwick’s art from her renowned degree show piece In the Kitchen (1977) through to her Piss Flowers (1991–2).

Chadwick’s experiments across mediums were innovative and unconventional; typically combining aesthetic beauty with an alliance of unusual, often grotesque materials. She consistently expressed a feminist perspective steeped in humour, and employed a vast range of materials in unexpected ways, incorporating bodily fluids, meat, flowers, chocolate and compost into her works. Through her skilled use of traditional fabrication methods and sophisticated technologies, she quickly established herself as a leading figure amongst Britain’s post-war avant-garde, becoming one of the first women artists to be nominated for the Turner Prize in 1987.

The exhibition will highlight Chadwick’s significant impact and contributions to British and international art history by demonstrating her relevance to contemporary feminist concerns, her evolution of material culture and her consistently playful approach.

Fiction and the Fantastic: LRB Close Readings Podcast

Listen here to Marina’s introduction to the LRB’s Close Reading series. The first four are with the marvellous Anna Della Subin. Marina has since spoken with the brilliant Adam Thirlwell – see below and click on the images to go to each episode on its release. Later in the series, Marina will be joined by Chloe Aridjis.

Episodes 1-4, with Anna Della Subin:

‘The Thousand and One Nights’

‘Gulliver’s Travels’ by Jonathan Swift

‘Invisible Cities’ by Italo Calvino

‘Alice in Wonderland’ by Lewis Carroll

Episodes 5-7 with Adam Thirlwell:

Stories by Franz Kafka

Tales by Jan Potocki and Isak Dinesen

James Hogg and Mikhail Bulgakov

 

July 15, 2025, Talk for The Folk Society, ‘How to Create Sanctuary Now?’, 19:00 BST, tickets £6.00 (£4 for members with promo code)

Get your tickets here!

For the last online talk before our summer break we're delighted to be welcoming Professor Dame Marina Warner @marinawarner.bsky.social for her talk 'How to Create Sanctuary Now?’ Tuesday 15 July at 19:00 BST, tickets £6.00 (£4 for members with promo code) www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/how-to-cre…

— The Folklore Society (@folkloresociety.bsky.social) 2025-07-08T20:39:23.005Z

[POSTPONED] July 17, 2025, Author’s Club Lunch event, 12.30pm, National Liberal Club, 1 Whitehall Place, London SW1A 2HE

What does sanctuary mean today? Drawing on a lifetime of engagement with literature, myth, history and tradition from different cultures, Marina Warner’s Sanctuary is an ambitious attempt to grapple with the sharpest questions that we are facing in today’s world of global turmoil.

More information here.

August 9, 2025, ‘Linder & Marina Warner: Gimme Danger’, Edinburgh International Book Festival, 4.30-5.30pm, Spiegeltent, Tickets here

Linder is one of Britain’s great pop­culture provocateurs: a post-punk musician and widely exhibited photocollage artist (infamously on the sleeve of the Buzzcocks’ ‘Orgasm Addict’ single). Here she’ll collide in discussion with the great, Booker Prize-shortlisted feminist writer Marina Warner on subjects including feminism, fashion, fairytales, and her artistic obsession with the human body, building upon the release of the pair’s collaborative Linder retrospective, Danger Came Smiling. Chaired by Edinburgh Art Festival director Kim McAleese.

August 10, 2025, ‘Marina Warner: A Place of Sanctuary’, Edinburgh International Book Festival, 2.45-3.45pm, Spiegeltent, Tickets here

What is ‘sanctuary’? Is it a sacred place where travellers and refugees might find safety and solace? Or is it a homeland to be shuttered and defended against incomers from the outside world? Exploring the concept throughout history and myth in her new book Sanctuary, prolific critic, cultural historian, and Booker Prize-shortlisted novelist Marina Warner joins us today to ask profound and urgent questions about the right to safety, home, freedom of movement, and peace. Chaired by Esa Aldegheri.