Jon McGregor on reworking his first published story from the female perspective, his enduring fascination with Lincolnshire and his new short story collection, This Isn’t The Sort Of Thing That Happens To Someone Like You.
Photograph © Dan Sinclair
‘Feelings can be very obscure but numbers never lie.’
Kevin Brazil on metrics, obsession and fitness.
‘An intense workout is an ecstasy of punishment packaged as self-improvement.’
Mary Wellesley on exercise, ritual and Barry’s Bootcamp.
‘I was not good at sports because I would not do sports because I did not have the body for sports because I would not do sports.’
Saba Sams on girlhood, embodiment and avoiding sports.
‘Following United rarely brings me any great joy and most often it depresses me. If I could disengage, I would.’
Jonny Thakkar on Manchester United.
‘I deployed my body against an opponent like a blunt and effective instrument.’
John Patrick McHugh on playing Gaelic football.
‘In winter there’s no danger of falling into the sky / Our bodies anchored to the ground by the weight of the light.’
‘He must have taken thousands of services in that time, but this still feels like the holiest thing he’s ever done.‘
‘I’m on the ground, and he is standing over me. Everything is muffled. I’m aware of the sound of running water somewhere.’
‘I wanted to see a communist victory, which I presumed to be inevitable. I wanted to see the fall of a city.’
