Literature in the Age of the Self: A Conversation with Rachel Cusk, Brian Dillon, and Vidyan Ravinthiran

This bonus episode consists in a recording of an authorial roundtable held at University College London on the 16th June 2025. Entitled ‘Literature in the Age of the Self’, it brought together three highly acclaimed contemporary writers whose work evinces a marked preoccupation with the experience and the representation of the self.

In this conversation chaired by Scarlett and Alice, Rachel Cusk, Brian Dillon, and Vidyan Ravinthiran discuss the self in connection with notions of style, character, and time. They also reflect on the relations between creative and academic writing, between literature and other arts, and on the status of the self in the age of AI and social media.

Guest Speakers:

Rachel Cusk, novelist, memoirist, essayist, and playwright.

Brian Dillon, essayist, memoirist, novelist, and curator.

Vidyan Ravinthiran, poet and memoirist and Associate Professor of English at Harvard.

Hosts:

Scarlett Baron, Associate Professor of English at University College London.

Alice Harberd, PhD student in the Philosophy Department at University College London.