Mark Gevisser and Jonny Steinberg discuss recent South African history, their personal relationship to Johannesburg, and their personal relationship to a divided city.
In the latest Granta podcast, Mark Gevisser and Jonny Steinberg discuss recent South African history, their personal relationship to Johannesburg, and their personal relationship to a divided city.
‘There’s a great power of home, no matter how far you travel, no matter how much you make other places your home, the place where you spent the bulk of your life has a body of meaning that’s irreplaceable.’
‘I think there should be a National Service of Hospitality. The best way to see the true face of humanity is to serve it a plate of chips.’
Camilla Grudova on bad-mannered customers.
‘Anyone who has ever worked night shifts will understand the vertiginous feeling that comes with staring down the day from the wrong end.’
A.K. Blakemore on working nights.
‘I was constantly reading job ads, trying to find my holy grail – a job I could stand to do, and someone foolish enough to hire me.’
Sandra Newman on learning how to play professional blackjack.
‘I loved being a receptionist. What I loved about it was playing the part of being a receptionist.’
Emily Berry on being a temporary office worker.
‘Every part of you would swell, including your eyeballs, and no matter how much water you drank, you were always dehydrated.’
Junot Díaz on working for a steel mill.
‘The city was also a place of possibility and even, paradoxically, liberation.’
Mark Gevisser examines the personal, political and social issues of transgender identity in America.
‘This set of characters are simultaneously medieval kings and modern aristocrats.’
Allen Bratton on adapting the Henriad and his debut novel Henry Henry.
‘I settled in, decades ago, to the idea that I was just going to write from a gay position, without explanation or excuse.’
Alan Hollinghurst on writing from the outsider’s perspective and cataloguing queer life.
‘You are what you do, and you are what you write, to some extent, I believe that at least.’
Lauren Oyler on personality, intention and the collapse between private and authorial selves.
‘My attempts are mocked by the monstrosities that leer up at me from the page.’
