Magnificent performance by Brazilian theatre group Coletivo Rubra of Dedicated to All the Others, based on Una‘s graphic novel Becoming Unbecoming on sexual violence. Now available online with illuminating Q&A afterwards and a slide show memorial to the victims of the Yorkshire Ripper.
Becoming Unbecoming enters 2016 on a high with fresh accolades
Una‘s powerful graphic memoir, Becoming Unbecoming, went from strength to strength in 2015, following appearances on BBC Radio 4 Woman’s Hour, and her nomination for the Emma Humphreys Memorial Prize, .
One girl's life in the Ripper years: article in BBC News magazine
‘There have been at least 19 books written about Sutcliffe, but, apart from one by a French feminist academic and Becoming Unbecoming, all are written by men… But the murders, and the police and press response, drove young women like me to feminism. Others were driven into fear. Una wanted to give those women, and all women and girls terrorised by sex crimes, a voice.’
Read journalist and activist Julie Bindel’s feature on Una and Becoming Unbecoming, for BBC News magazine.
Overcoming adversity, becoming brilliant: Una interview with The F-Word
‘As a big fan of graphic novels, I was excited to learn of a new release by a Yorkshire woman with the pen name Una. Being of northern origin, I’m always interested in hearing the voices of woman – and men – from the north of the country, particularly as their voices often go unheard or overlooked in comparison to those from the south and, more specifically, the south-east. I’m delighted to report that the novel Becoming Unbecoming is an absolute sensation: one of my favourite books of the year and, possibly, the best graphic novel I’ve ever read.’
Read Una’s interview with Joanna Whitehead of The F-Word.
Elle's Ultimate Feminist Reading List
‘An incredibly powerful new graphic novel… The illustrations are beautiful and the words are a powerful demand listen to women’s voices.’
Becoming Unbecoming sits alongside feminist classics such as The Colour Purple by Alice Walker and Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own, in Anna James’ Ultimate Feminist Reading List, as featured on Elle UK. See the full selection here.
Una's interview on BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour
BBC Radio 4 Woman’s Hour presenter has described Becoming Unbecoming as ‘touching, moving and tackling a really serious subject. A wonderful, wonderful book’. Listen again to Una’s appearance on Woman’s Hour, where she discusses the blame and shame associated with gender violence, and why the graphic form is the perfect medium through which to communicate difficult subjects.
Q & A with Big Issue North
Why do cultural forms so often dramatise the rape and murder of women and rarely men? Why should the notion of survivor be treated with caution? Will writing this book – or conveying your ideas to broad audiences more generally – ever compensate for a lack of justice?
Look at Una’s answers to these probing questions and read her thoughts about the nature of her work, in an honest and intriguing interview with Big Issue North.
Top Five feature for We Love This Book
‘It’s a mistake to think of comics as just a quick read on the bus, or a specific, formulaic type of aesthetic. As with all artistic realms there are an infinite variety of artists and writers working in the medium.’
Una makes a guest appearance on We Love This Book’s regular Top Five feature slot, selecting her ‘Top Five: Graphic Novels with Ambitious and Experimental Tendencies’. Full feature here.
Featured book on Emerald Street
‘Becoming Unbecoming shows what patriarchal violence does, on a nationwide and on a personal level…. But this graphic novel also shows what happen when women refuse to be silent. Read this. Get angry. Start shouting.’
This powerful call to arms appeared in Emerald Street – Stylist magazine’s online counterpart. Selected for the Reading Room feature, Becoming Unbecoming is described as ‘honest, matter of fact and absolutely gut wrenching’.
Una
Una is a comics artist and writer. She has 20 years experience in community arts education with adult learners and 8 years experience lecturing in fine art and illustration. She has a PhD in Fine Art Practice from Loughborough University, MFA (University of Leeds) and a 1st class BA Hons (Leeds Arts University). Una’s first graphic novel Becoming Unbecoming(Myriad Editions, 2015) has been widely translated and was featured on BBC Radio 4 Open Book and Woman’s Hour, Oprah.com and in Newsweek and Elle magazine.
Una received Arts Council England (ACE) funding for a creative writing/drawing project which resulted in a 40 page comic book On Sanity: One Day In Two Lives (2016) and a collaborative zine We All Start At The Beginning (2016). Una’s latest comic book Cree (2018) was commissioned by New Writing North and Durham Book Festival. She is currently working on a second graphic novel, Eve, for Virago Press and is supported by ACE for two years of professional development.