Explore Essays and memoir
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On Meeting Mrs Obama
Sarah Ladipo Manyika
‘Michelle’s story, while deeply rooted in the American story, speaks to experiences that are universal.’
Ghostlands
Jennifer Kabat
Jennifer Kabat on the Anti-Rent War, one of the earliest moments of rural populism in the US, and something few know about outside the Catskill Mountains.
A Night in the Engadine
John Kaag
John Kaag, author of Hiking with Nietzsche, camps out in the mountains of the Engadine where Nietzsche wrote Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
The Guests
Hisham Matar
‘Strangely, it was Joseph Conrad who introduced me to Edward Said and not the other way around.’
Harmflesh
Margie Orford
‘This burning girl that I am with skin stretched white hot across unfair flesh. Harmflesh.’
Two Keiths and the Wrong Piano
Hanif Kureishi
‘My response to the music had reminded me that concealed inside myself was a more excitable and open self raring to get out.’
Confessions of a White Vampire
Jeremy Narby
‘Many of the people I was living with considered me a white vampire, who killed to extract human fat.’ Jeremy Narby on the Amazonian myth of the white vampire.
Imperium
Ryszard Kapuściński
Ryszard Kapuściński, once the only foreign correspondent for the Polish Press Agency, on the concept of borders.
Best Book of 2013: Tom Drury’s Pacific
John Patrick McHugh
‘There is a remarkable flow to the novel, like that aimless but essential drunken chatter after your third pint.’ John Patrick McHugh on why Tom Drury’s Pacific is the best book of 2013.
The Trouble With Rape
April Ayers Lawson
April Ayers Lawson on rape, trauma, and the difficulty of speaking out about sexual abuse.
All Hail the Holy Bone
Maggie O’Farrell
‘It is part angel, part lepidopteran, part Rorschach inkblot.’
