Pounding a Nail
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Sheila Heti and Tao Lin In Conversation
Sheila Heti & Tao Lin
Sheila Heti and Tao Lin discuss writing about motherhood and psychedelics, what changes when you begin to write under contract, and narrative forms that mimic the menstrual cycle.
Cormac James | Notes on Craft
Cormac James
‘My most recent writing lesson came from Elizabeth Strout, a few months ago. Pay attention, is all she taught me, and it was plenty.’
Court
Blake Morrison
‘One by one they’re led into the box. They swear their oath. They confirm their name, their employment, why they were where they say they were, what it was they saw.’
The World Is a Narrow Bridge
Aaron Thier
‘They’re back on I-95, northbound this time, the city disappearing behind them, the sun setting like a piece of pink candy over the Everglades.’
Africa Writes
Caitlin Pearson
The Royal African Society takes a look back at the history of the Africa Writes festival, their annual celebration of contemporary literature from Africa and the diaspora.
Matalasi
Jenny Bennett-Tuionetoa
Jenny Bennett-Tuionetoa’s ‘Matalasi’ is the Pacific winner of the 2018 Commonwealth Short Story Prize.
The Dive
Samsun Knight
‘What’s wrong is that she cannot breathe.’ Samsun Knight’s ‘The Dive’ is the winner of the 2018 Disquiet Literary Prize
Ways of Looking
Lulah Ellender
‘He is like a mantling hawk, his heft and body spreading over his prey as he tears off pieces of her with his eyes.’ Lulah Ellender on the male gaze.
Gooseen
Nuala O’Connor
Nuala O’Connor’s short story about Nora Barnacle, and her first meetings with James Joyce.
Two Poems
Andrew McMillan
‘I hadn’t / realised it possible / that I might grow into kinder / ownership of my own looks’
The Break-up of the Ice
Lucie Elven
‘Deeper in the port, a woman was speaking, a knitting process in which letters were picked and drawn out of loops of sound, detaching in part and rejoining, like a sort of memory.’ New fiction by Lucie Elven
Diary
Gunnar Smoliansky
These prints from Gunnar Smoliansky's Diary consolidated his position as a major photographer.
Challenger Deep
Ashley Hutson
‘The message was cheerful, positive. I did not express weakness on my son’s behalf: this is a mother’s first rule.’
Katharine Kilalea and Emily Berry In Conversation
Katharine Kilalea & Emily Berry
Katharine Kilalea and Emily Berry discuss architecture, psychoanalysis and the different types of exposure that come with writing prose and poetry.
William Atkins In Conversation
William Atkins & Luke Neima
William Atkins in conversation about his new book, The Immeasurable World: Journeys in Desert Places.
Two Poems
Kristín Ómarsdóttir
‘cut a piece from a lip and put in a secret place’ – New poetry translated from the Icelandic by Vala Thorodds.
The Man Who Lived
Snigdha Poonam
Snigdha Poonam on how WhatsApp is being used to encourage mob violence in India.
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.
West
Carys Davies
Carys Davies' new novel is a mesmerising depiction of the uncharted wilderness beyond the Mississippi River
Amy Bloom | Five Things Right Now
Amy Bloom
Amy Bloom shares five things she’s reading, watching and thinking about right now.
Fathers and Sons
Benjamin Markovits
‘For a while it wasn’t clear how good he would become, and then it was. He went up the rankings, stopped, and started going down.’
Acts of Infidelity
Lena Andersson
‘Anticipation made it difficult for Ester to swallow.’ Translated from the Swedish by Saskia Vogel.
Four Syrian Borders: A Motorcycle Journey, 2007
Esa Aldegheri & Gavin Francis
‘The landscape, glimpsed through plumes of dust thrown up by trucks, grew drier, more hostile as it climbed away from the sea.’
Oh, the Obvious
Christine Schutt
‘A wizened spring, the sickly prickly pear and organ pipe cacti were so riddled with holes they might have been targets.’
The Duchess of Albany
Christine Schutt
‘The permanence of his absence is a noise she hears when she listens to how quiet.’
Days of Awe
A.M. Homes
Read the title story from AM Homes' dazzling new collection of short stories, Days of Awe, available now from Granta Books.
Mother’s Death
Stephen Sharp
‘Last year father attacked me as a “wet radish”. This caused me to give up writing diary entries.’
Snow Job
Brian Allen Carr
‘I like to think the ones who are worst at coloring will remember me the longest.’
Song of the Andoumboulou: 212
Nathaniel Mackey
—brother b’s roman sojourn— Brother B gathered his locks, bound them with a...
Palmyra
Charles Glass & Don McCullin
‘ISIS’s second conquest of Palmyra astonished everyone, and fed the belief in a Syrian government conspiracy to assist ISIS.’
Lake Like a Mirror
Ho Sok Fong
‘If she’d swerved any harder, she would have crashed right into the lake.’ New fiction by Ho Sok Fong, translated from the Chinese by Natascha Bruce.
