Since beginning this project, I have started thinking a lot more about material culture, the objects, and the places/spaces connected with the life and works of Frances Burney. Her relationship to the arts and the applied arts, for one, but also signifying objects in her life and the houses she lived in. I have realised that these new avenues of investigation provide a broader approach and clarify / significantly enlarge my vision. Now my Burney is a holistic and plural affaire as never before. So much beyond text. Text unbound.

The moment is really ripe for this turn in my scholarship. Statues, forms of memorialization, writers’ house museums, new ideas about homes and homing, making as a form of writing. I can tap in all these threads and place Burney within this new research community. “To work we go,” as La Burney wrote to her sister. Nous y allons.

Musings around writing / The Lady with the Balloon Hat by Francesca Saggini is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0

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