Granta | The Home of New Writing

Explore Essays and memoir

After Gandhi

Trevor Fishlock

‘His room is as he left it, furnished with a carpet, a spinning wheel, a low white table, a mattress and cushion.’

After Zero Hour

Janine di Giovanni

‘It seemed there was a little piece of Iraqi earth inside me that refused to let me go.’

Aftermath

Peregrine Hodson

‘We have to find a way to balance life with memory.’

Airds Moss

Kathleen Jamie

‘It could almost have been Neolithic, an ancient and mysterious earthworks.’

Ali Fitzgerald | Notes on Craft

Ali Fitzgerald

Notes on crafting a graphic memoir from Ali Fitzgerald.

Alicja Gescinska | On Europe

Alicja Gescinska

‘Europe has proved to be at its best when it embraced unity in diversity.’

All That Was Familiar

Abubakar Adam Ibrahim

The story of two women fleeing Boko Haram in north-east Nigeria.

American Maniac

Rafael Frumkin

‘I would peel wrappers off sandwiches, remove noodles from their boxes, fry up meat before any authorities had the chance to track me and my bounty down.’

Among the Tulips

Richard Holmes

‘When young James Boswell arrived in Holland in August 1763 at the age of twenty-two, his first impulse was to commit suicide.‘

An (almost) perfect day

Anne De Gelas

‘I think of the self-portrait as a mirror of all the violence that befalls us.’

An Egyptian in Baghdad

Amitav Ghosh

‘It was exactly three weeks since Saddam Hussein had invaded Kuwait, and miraculously, Abu-Ali, the old shopkeeper, was on his feet.’

An Open Letter to Mbeki

Petina Gappah

‘You are human, Mr Mbeki, and are therefore prey to the resentments and obstinacies that plague the mere mortal.’

An Unfathomable Ship

Uwe Johnson

‘It is the name of an American ammunition ship which went aground in the summer of 1944; as a result the ship sank, since which time only the tips of its derricks and masts and a corner of the bridge are visible.’

Anjali Joseph | First Sentence

Anjali Joseph

‘I kept returning to the Beckett stories, a favourite since I came upon them in my late teens.’