‘We have not yet come to the most remarkable episode in this quasi-mythological quest for the genesis of the eel.’
Graham Swift was born in London in 1949.His novels include Waterland, Shuttlecock and Last Orders (Picador/Vintage) which won the Booker Prize in 1996. His most recent novel, England and Other Stories, was published in 2014. He was one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists in 1983.
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‘We meet at various points in the great swathes of the past that neither of us were alive to witness.’
Allen Bratton on a daytrip to a castle with his older boyfriend.
‘Listening to three white poets, whom I suspect are academics, talk about the state of poetry.’
Oluwaseun Olayiwola eavesdrops on an older generation.
‘I’d been dubious about his company at first.’
Sarah Moss on watching Shakespeare with her twelve-year-old son.
‘She didn’t trust us because, to her, tenants were like children.’
Kate Zambreno on negotiating with her older landlady.
‘A moment now swallowed in embarrassment, I asked a question only a young person might ask an older one.’
Lynne Tillman on trying to understand what makes a generation.
‘Frank Randall had three sons: Michael, Eddy and Mark. That was fine by him‘.
‘The death of a father is, in most cases, an inevitable passage of life.’
‘Sometimes it haunts you like a knell, sometimes it's the motto for unimagined privilege.’
‘Then he led me out into the noise and the glare and the stink.’
‘Sorting out the world! He should have sorted out himself and his own jeopardized household.’
