What We Leave We Carry with Colin Grant, Maria Jastrzębska, Amanda Vilanova and Clementine Burnley

Wed 26 Aug 2026, 7.45pm, Southbank Centre, Purcell Room, Tickets from £23, Run time 1 hour and 15 minutes (approx).

More information here.

What do we leave behind when we move to a new place – and what do we carry with us, physically and emotionally, wherever we land?

Grant has travelled the country with writers from WritersMosaic, listening to stories of migration – foundational tales of arriving in a new land, along with rarely spoken tales of love and loss.

What We Leave We Carry is a chance to listen to Britain – in all its richness and complexity.

Grant is joined by storytellers from this oral history sharing the secrets of their migrant songs and objects: Suzanne Harrington, an Irish writer who travelled with an ‘introductory’ sick note from her psychiatrist; Maria Jastrzębska, a Polish poet recounting partisan songs that poked fun at Hitler; Amanda Vilanova, a Puerto Rican actor gifted her mother’s jewellery to sell in an emergency; and Clementine Burnley, a Cameroonian psychotherapist who arrived as a student in 1980s Glasgow inspired by ‘Kung Fu Fighting’.

The evening also features live Afro-Colombian music and dance from Akolá Tambó.