How do you tell the story of those who haven't had their stories told? Bernardine Evaristo is a Booker-Prize-winning novelist and decades-long champion of up-and-coming writers. On this episode, she describes her own early career: her years of drafting, redrafting, publishing, then redrafting again, her first verse novel Lara (1997 & 2009). Written in the narrative poetry form that has become Bernardine's signature, Lara spans generations and continents to present the origins of a mixed family much like Bernardine's own. Her first foray into novel writing, it charted a course and explored themes that would define her career. 'I took this manuscript of 200 pages ... and threw it in the bin.'   Craft is brought to you by Wasafiri, the magazine of international contemporary writing, and is sponsored by Arts Council England, and Queen Mary University of London. Check out our website, www.wasafiri.org, for outtakes and a full transcript of this interview, and much more from writers all over the world. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.