Explore Essays and memoir
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João’s War
Julia Rochester
‘He repeatedly said, “I should have been a priest.“ He was right. People sought his benediction.’
After Silk Road
Mike Power
‘The Dark Web is a shadow internet, an unindexed, unseen and lawless corner of cyberspace.’
Teachers
Sandy Tolan
‘They came from Europe, Palestine and America, drawn by the story of Ramzi and Al Kamandjâti, by the young traveller’s spirit of adventure, and by the desire to use their musical talents for work that could make a difference in the world.’
A Brief History of a Musical Failure
Catherine Tice
‘At the end of the piece, there was silence, followed by a sudden thunder of feet and bows on the stands. A thrilling noise.’
Lullaby
Mary Ruefle
‘I wasn’t bored, I was relaxed, and, I suppose, happy (I’ve never been able to figure out how happiness feels).’
David Searcy | First Sentence
David Searcy
‘When I was a kid, my family doctor, right through high school, was this wonderful, funny guy with a little Boston Blackie moustache who looked a lot like Burgess Meredith.’
Miroslav Penkov | First Sentence
Miroslav Penkov
‘It was an old woman’s racism that inspired the first line of ‘Blood Money’.’
Ross Raisin | On Tour
Ross Raisin
‘I was up at 5.30 this morning, to screaming, and it’s afternoon now and I’m covered in hummus and struggling to muster the energy to remove it from myself.’
Dutch Harbor Nights
Jim Ruland
‘When one of the fishermen starts belting out ‘All My Rowdy Friends Are Coming Out Tonight’, it feels like a prophecy come to life.’
How to be Gay and Indian
Manil Suri
‘This was supposed to be my great in-your-face coming-out campaign, which I’d fretted over for months beforehand. Had India suddenly lost its conservativeness, turned enlightened, even hip?’
Playing the Odds
David Szalay
‘What, I wonder now, must the texture of my life have been like then, that winning those sort of sums failed to leave even the slightest mark on my memory?’
