In 1942, my mother would sit on the bus home from school and eat an imaginary sandwich. The journey on the 436 from Guildford to Addlestone took over an hour and was followed by a long walk from the bus stop to the house. To outwit her hunger she stared into the aisle of the bus and pictured a sandw…
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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.
‘He takes the knife, cuts the barb from the body, sends it back to the depths of the river.’
An extract from Not a River by Selva Almada, translated by Annie McDermott.
‘The past is no longer behind me but in front.’
An extract from About Ed by Robert Glück.
‘How do we imagine the past of those we love?’
Arthur Asseraf on family and fractured memories.
‘you notice / that some of these men / are full of passionate music / while others pain your ears’
Poetry by Elvis Bego.
‘The place we come from, the place we call home, is the home of our suffering.’
Jamaica Kincaid talks about finding her way to writing.
‘Only a handful of Chinese before him had journeyed to the West.’
