New on Granta.com

The Cheffe

Marie NDiaye

Rebecca Solnit:
An Online Reader

Ivan Kirwan-Taylor

In the Cut

Susanna Moore

Four Poems

Crispin Best

Jianan Qian | First Sentence

Jianan Qian

Borderland

Fiction from the Nobel-prize-winning author Olga Tokarczuk

How to Take a Literary Selfie

Sylvie Weil explains what it means to write a literary selfie.

Toni Morrison In Conversation

‘If I wanted to read it, I would have to write it.’ Toni Morrison in Conversation

Dem bones, dem bones, dem dry bones

Edoardo Albert on five archaeological findings that bring the past to life.

A Clean, Well-Lighted Place

Peter Stamm on the oldest barber in Switzerland, and Michael Hofmann on translating Peter Stamm.

Little nothings: Nabokov’s road notes

Elsa Court on the road trips Vladimir Nabokov took during the writing of Lolita.

Julia Armfield | First Sentence

‘A first line is a threat, I think.’ Julia Armfield on the first sentence of her story ‘Longshore Drift’

From the editor’s desk

A selection of correspondence with authors during the early years of the magazine.

2019 T.S. Eliot Prize Shortlist

Three Poems

Anthony Anaxagorou

‘we are born / to a siren and the wail of each other’

Zeus

Fiona Benson

‘days I talked with Zeus / I ate only ice / felt the blood trouble and burn / under my skin’

A Sharing Economy

Karen Solie

‘The Paying Guest rises in the middle of the night / to turn off the radio where no radio exists’

The Easel

Sharon Olds

‘When I build a fire, I feel purposeful.’

Cyan

Paul Farley

‘I’m holding out. / I’m blue in the face.’

40 Years of Granta

Where is Kigali?

Lindsey Hilsum

‘Evariste was the nightwatchman. He and I were alone in the house in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, when the killing started.’

The Chelsea Affect

Arthur Miller

‘Despite parboiling myself in the shower a few times I began to like the hotel.’

Let There Be Light!

David Feuer

‘Probably, the Rabbi would have preferred to find a Hasidic psychiatrist, but unfortunately there was no such thing.’

Perchance to Pick One’s Nose

Jan Morris

‘Shame and regret are certainly not the same things: je ne regrette rien, like charity, can cover a multitude of sins.’

Nadine at Forty

Hilary Mantel

‘Each day we re-enact, on ourselves, what was done to us.’

Tiger’s Ghost

Jennie Erdal

‘For nearly fifteen years I wrote hundreds of letters that weren't from me. They ranged from perfunctory thank-you notes and expressions of condolence, to extensive correspondence with the great and the good: politicians, newspaper editors, bishops, members of the House of Lords.’

The Latest from Granta Books

Peter Pomerantsev on the Politics of Feeling

Peter Pomerantsev speaks to Devorah Baum about polarisation in politics, the role that Russia plays in the fantasy life of the West, and how to discuss politics without spitting at your opponents.

Authors

Kathryn Scanlan | Notes on Craft

Kathryn Scanlan

‘I try to write a sentence as unbudging and fully itself as some object sitting on a shelf in my office.’

Louise Bourgeois as I Knew Her

Jean Frémon

‘The portrait is built up of tiny strokes, one added upon another, like dashes of pencil.’ Translated from the French by Cole Swensen.

Charlotte Collins | Notes on Craft

Charlotte Collins

Charlotte Collins on the craft of translation. ‘Literary translators don’t just translate the ‘meaning’ of a text; we translate the feel of it.’

Amit Chaudhuri | First Sentence

Amit Chaudhuri

‘A scene in which nothing is ostensibly happening will absorb me; so will a paragraph that contains no vital piece of information.’