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Best Book of 1988:
Bad Behavior

Alan Rossi

Alan Rossi on why Bad Behavior is the best book of 1988.

Just As It Was

Lucy Scholes

‘Unnatural is as fitting a term as any to describe the life Athill went on to lead, in that the choices she makes continually push against the conventions of her upbringing, class and gender. ’

Best Book of 1989: A House with Four Rooms

Esther Rutter

Esther Rutter on why A House with Four Rooms by Rumer Godden is the best book of 1989.

Best Book of 1993: To Live

Jianan Qian

Jianan Qian on why Yu Hua’s To Live is the best book of 1993.

On Europe | Peter Stamm

Peter Stamm

Peter Stamm on the Swiss referendum to join the EU. Translated from the German by Michael Hofmann.

Introduction

Sigrid Rausing

‘Somewhere in-between is the truth. Somewhere in-between is the story, or at least the European story.’

Orhan Pamuk | On Europe

Orhan Pamuk

‘In the part of the world where I come from, Europe is not just an ideal and a beautiful dream’ Translated from the Turkish by Ekin Oklap.

Jacqueline Rose | On Europe

Jacqueline Rose

‘We will get nowhere in understanding the present crisis unless we, as Europeans, are willing to look into the dark heart of ourselves.’

Exile

Elif Shafak

‘The first time I heard the word exile – sürgün – in Turkish, I was a child. It struck me how closely it rhymed with another word: hüzün – melancholy.’

Making

Esther Rutter

‘Are you a writer who knits, or a knitter who writes?’

On Tastelessness

Adam O’Fallon Price

‘Write through your first ending is advice I give, again and again.’

Jianan Qian | First Sentence

Jianan Qian

‘For every witness, history unfolded at some other time, and in some other place.’ Jianan Qian on the first sentence of her story, ‘To the Dogs’.

Real Men

Mohamed Mbougar Sarr

Anna Leader’s translation of ‘Real Men’ by Mohamed Mbougar Sarr is the winner of the 2019 Harvill Secker Young Translators’ Prize.

Lois and Varga

Lisa Taddeo

‘Shells, like the kind on the sand of the beach, that’s all they are. That’s all any of us are. All these colored shells, each one trying to be picked up before the rest.’ New fiction by Lisa Taddeo.