Ways of Being True
Sun 23 May 2021
Three storytellers discuss what constitutes historical truth and the tools they use to illuminate the blind spots of dominant narratives
Who makes the world we live in? Who is good and who is bad? The history books tell us one thing, but time and access to a greater variety of sources is proving how skewed the so-called truth can be. We have gathered, Aida Edemariam, whose account of her grandmother's life, A Wife's Tale, gives an intimate spin on Ethiopian history; Nikesh Shukla, who has just released a memoir, Brown Baby, that looks both forward and backward; and filmmaker Stella Corradi who directed Sitting In Limbo, Stephen Thompson's searing account of the Windrush scandal. Together, they discuss the choices that confront any storyteller tasked with retelling history. What, for them, are the ways of being true?