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Explore Essays and memoir

Black and Female

Tsitsi Dangarembga

‘By the time I was in my teens, I had taken up an existence framed by a double negative: not male, not white.’

An excerpt from Tsitsi Dangarembga’s essay collection, Black and Female.

The Stars Are Blind

Anna Dorn

‘A few years ago, while in between jobs, I started doing astrology readings for cash.’

Anna Dorn on her astrology journey.

On Marble

Rachel Cusk

‘Two things – beauty and horror – are especially lasting.’

Rachel Cusk visits a marble bearing island in Greece’s Aegean sea.

On Sizewell C

William Atkins

‘Where do we go, as a country, for power?’

William Atkins on the proposed nuclear power station in Suffolk.

Beyond Conversion Therapy

Kevin Childs

‘When I was growing up in his house, religion was his crutch, a justification for his behaviour.’

Kevin Childs on growing up queer in a Catholic household.

Joy and Insecurity in Port-au-Prince

Jason Allen-Paisant

‘The body is the first measurement of time: to reclaim time is to reclaim the body.’

Jason Allen-Paisant in Haiti.

Being-in-the-World

Geoff Dyer

‘Even experienced users get scared because it’s so far out.’

Geoff Dyer on ageing and understanding the self.

Notes on Craft

Amy Bloom

‘Revision for me is relief. It is reassurance.’

Amy Bloom on the pleasures of revising.

Personal Growth

Marina Benjamin

‘Refusal is the last recourse of the powerless.’

Marina Benjamin on her years of not eating, and not growing.

Notes on Craft

Nataliya Deleva

‘I didn’t want to write Arrival from a place of exile or outcast.’ Nataliya Deleva on writing in her adoptive language.

The Hour of the Wolf

Fatima Bhutto

‘Though I have had dogs all my life, Coco is my first real companion.’

Fatima Bhutto on grief.

In the Heart of the Hall of Mirrors

Chris Dennis

‘If the heart has a great hall then it must also have a dungeon.’

Memoir by Chris Dennis.

She Used to Sing Opera

Imogen Crimp

‘I used to be ashamed of it, though I’m not sure what exactly felt shameful.’

On training to be an opera singer.

Best Book of 1982: A Boy’s Own Story

O Thiam Chin

‘It didn’t occur to me that reading and being a reader was two very distinct things, one an act and a skill, and the other a role and a persona’

O Thiam Chin’s best book of 1982.