Christopher de Hamel for The Migrants: A Memoir with Manuscripts

Christopher de Hamel is coming to Topping & Company Booksellers on Friday 11 September to talk about his new book, The Migrants: A Memoir with Manuscripts. It's a long-overdue visit for anyone who follows the world of illuminated manuscripts, as de Hamel is one of the most recognised names in the field.

He's spent a career at Sotheby's and Cambridge University, and by his own account he's probably handled more medieval manuscripts than anyone alive. That lifelong proximity to the books comes through in everything he writes, and The Migrants is no exception. He describes it as a coming-of-age saga with extraordinary twists that spans hundreds of years and tens of thousands of miles, tracing the journeys of books and people through a tale of colonisation and the migration of culture, told with passion, humour and a lifetime's reflection.

If you're not already familiar with his work, it's a good place to start. His books have been translated into numerous languages, including A History of Illuminated Manuscripts, Meetings with Remarkable Manuscripts — which picked up both the Duff Cooper Prize and the Wolfson History Prize — The Book in the Cathedral: The Last Relic of Thomas Becket, and The Posthumous Papers of the Manuscripts Club. This is a writer who knows his subject inside out, and The Migrants brings that expertise to a more personal, memoir-style narrative.

The evening runs from 7:00pm to 8:00pm at Topping & Company, 1 Museum Street, YO1 7DT, with doors opening at 6:30pm.