‘The terrain of literature is this space where you can pose these paradoxes of personal and political ethics’
Granta Magazine’s Josie Mitchell speaks to Anthony Marra about being one of Granta’s 2017 Best of Young American Novelists.
They discuss how he got his start in writing, paradoxes in literature and the (otherwise useless) qualities that make for a good author.
‘I think there should be a National Service of Hospitality. The best way to see the true face of humanity is to serve it a plate of chips.’
Camilla Grudova on bad-mannered customers.
‘Anyone who has ever worked night shifts will understand the vertiginous feeling that comes with staring down the day from the wrong end.’
A.K. Blakemore on working nights.
‘I was constantly reading job ads, trying to find my holy grail – a job I could stand to do, and someone foolish enough to hire me.’
Sandra Newman on learning how to play professional blackjack.
‘I loved being a receptionist. What I loved about it was playing the part of being a receptionist.’
Emily Berry on being a temporary office worker.
‘Every part of you would swell, including your eyeballs, and no matter how much water you drank, you were always dehydrated.’
Junot Díaz on working for a steel mill.
‘Frank Laganà stood on the cliff suited in black, as straight as an exclamation point, poised to leap to his death once again.’
‘If a bar has a St Pauli flag, they know they will find reliably leftish people inside.’
Imogen West-Knights introduces Ilyes Griyeb’s photographs.
‘Without obsession, I don’t think I’d get anywhere.’
Two authors discuss atmosphere, obsession and going ‘too far’.
‘i think again, love, that t believe in this / would be t chapen the accident of our own gift’
Two poems from James Conor Patterson’s collection, bandit country.
Ntsika Kota is the winner of the 2022 Commonwealth Short Story Prize for Africa.
‘Jack Nicholson, I've heard, used to own one. And I understand why.’
