Rachel Clarke
The Harriet Martineau Lecture
Saturday 23 May, 12.00pm
The Spiegeltent
Tickets: £10.00 - £12.00
A highlight of Norwich’s annual literary calendar, this year’s Harriet Martineau Lecture will be delivered by writer and NHS palliative care doctor Rachel Clarke. Rachel is the award-winning author of four Sunday Times bestselling books, including The Story of a Heart (winner of the 2025 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction), Dear Life and Breathtaking.
The first Harriet Martineau Lecture was delivered by Ali Smith in May 2013 and featured a call to draw Harriet Martineau’s face onto £5 notes in protest at the decision to remove Elizabeth Fry from the same note. Since then the likes of Kate Mosse, Masha Gessen, Linton Kwesi-Johnson, Sarah Perry, Ellah P. Wakatama, Kit de Waal, Charlotte Higgins and Val McDermid have given the lecture, variously exploring Martineau’s internationalism, inspiration for feminism, and role in the abolition of slavery.
Dr Rachel Clarke is an NHS palliative care doctor, former television journalist and the award-winning author of four Sunday Times bestselling books including The Story of a Heart (winner of the 2025 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction & shortlisted for the 2024 Baillie Gifford Prize), Dear Life (shortlisted for the 2020 Costa Biography Award & longlisted for the 2020 Baillie Gifford Prize) and Breathtaking (adapted into a major television series broadcast by ITVX in 2024 & nominated for a Royal Television Society Award for Best Limited Series 2025).
Rachel writes for the Guardian, Sunday Times, New Statesman and Lancet among others. Her television and radio appearances include BBC Question Time, BBC Newsnight, Channel 4 News and BBC Woman’s Hour.
Important information
Venue: The Spiegeltent
Duration: 1 hour
Tickets
Tickets: £12.00
Concessions: 10% off tickets priced £10 or over for D/deaf or disabled, Full-time students, Go 4Less cardholders and those on Universal Credit
Essential Companions: Any audience member requiring an essential carer/companion can get one free ticket. Relevant discounts or concessions still apply to the paid ticket.
City of Literature offer: Book 3+ City of Literature events in the same transaction and get 10% off (excludes workshops)
Select a performance
Saturday
23 May
12:00 pm
£10.00 - £12.00
With thanks to
City of Literature is a Norfolk & Norwich Festival and National Centre for Writing presentation, programmed by the National Centre for Writing.