Explore Essays and memoir
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I’m Black So You Don’t Have to Be
Colin Grant
'Can the black author really write out of her or his colour? In writing about black characters can they ever escape race?' Colin Grant looks at the evolution of racial politics.
Nine Pints
Rose George
‘My blood is on its way to becoming something that even when given for free can be brokered and sold like ingots or wheat.’
Abscessed Tooth
Debra Gwartney
‘Silence allows me to pretend that this happened to someone else a long time ago, and not to me.’
To the Castle and Back
Václav Havel
‘I am announcing that I have returned from the USA. I thank all of those who worked in the domestic resistance. Likewise I thank all of us who worked in the foreign resistance.’
Addressing Mental Health Through Reading Well
Debbie Hicks
‘Reading Well is more than just a booklist – it represents the power of reading to change lives.’
The Munduruku People Against Brazil
Tiffany Higgins
‘The Middle Tapajós Munduruku are not alone. Indigenous and traditional communities throughout the Tapajós River basin are facing increased degradation of their environment and the cultural sustenance practices that form the foundation of their lifeways.’
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.’
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.
The Last Shopkeepers of London
David Flusfeder
‘It became a kind of mission to find contemporaries of theirs that weren’t closing down, establishments that have continued to flourish, or at least endure.’
The Leech Barometer
Rebecca Giggs
‘To be consumed by leeches is to be vital, to be animate, though it is also to be reminded you are something else’s prey, and therefore porous and mortal.’
The one/many problem
Daisy Hildyard
‘Other creatures literally stop me breathing. There are so many of them, and only one of me.’ Daisy Hildyard writes about her research into the animal kingdom.
