I Want to Talk to You

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What to expect

Brought to you by Penguin.

Crafted over twenty-five years, I Want to Talk to You invites you into a conversation about literature, art and music, identity, grief and everything in between

As a young journalist, Diana Evans was catapulted overnight into the role of culture editor, going on to interview a roster of stars including Lauryn Hill, Viola Davis, Alice Walker and Edward Enninful.

In these portraits of contemporary icons, the author remains the observer. Alongside them, in pieces collected here for the first time, we also see her turning the lens on herself. We watch as she dances on stages in London and travels through Cuba. We sit beside her desk as she develops her voice as a writer, shaped by her love for Jean Rhys, James Baldwin and Toni Morrison. We walk by her side as she navigates the world – her family and the midlife sandwich, reflections on fashion, yoga, the British monarchy and lockdowns, and the lasting impact of George Floyd and Grenfell.

'Every piece feels beautifully sewn together and complete’ BERNARDINE EVARISTO
'Truly insightful, conversational and unique... Absolutely brilliant' ORE AGBAJE-WILLIAMS
'Intimate and moving... Elegant in tone and finely wrought in form' EKOW ESHUN
'A celebration of a career that has been anything but ordinary and an intellectual mind forever evolving. A blueprint for all of us straddling between fiction and journalism, who want to create meaningful, transcendent work' CHARLIE BRINKHURST-CUFF

© Diana Evans 2025 (P) Penguin Audio 2025

Critics Review

A pleasure and an invigoration
Guardian
Evans’s nonfiction marries that faith in the value of subjective experience to a fierce intellect; the result is a fascinating overview not only of a writer’s evolution but of the shifts in our understanding of art as…”activism and community”
Observer
Perceptive and empathetic... This was always going to be a book that grabs you by the lapels and insists on you listening but all the same, you do emerge impressed and better informed -- and also kind of windswept and happy
Financial Times
There is a depth and integrity to Diana Evans’s writing; every piece feels beautifully sewn together and complete
BERNARDINE EVARISTO
Thoughtfully layered pieces... deeply personal
Red
Luminously questioning, always intelligent and unafraid of confronting the impact others can have on us
ORE AGBAJE-WILLIAMS, author of The Three of Us
An intimate and moving meditation on the mysteries of writing and the pleasures of reading. Elegant in tone and finely wrought in form, it is a deeply insightful, and also profoundly enjoyable, collection
EKOW ESHUN, author of The Strangers
A celebration of a career that has been anything but ordinary and an intellectual mind forever evolving. A blueprint for all of us straddling between fiction and journalism, who want to create meaningful, transcendent work
CHARLIE BRINKHURST-CUFF, editor of Mother Country
[A] compelling collection of essays… an insightful examination of both the cultural and deeply personal events that have influenced the making of a great writer
Financial Times, *Summer Reads of 2025*
One of our most outstanding writers
Bernardine Evaristo

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