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Northern Soul
Simon Armitage
‘I live on the border, between two states. I've lived here all my life, just about, and I know this place like the back of my hand’.
Ian Jack
Ian Jack, Remembered
‘Ian was a gifted journalist and editor of immense common sense, and had an insatiable curiosity about the world around him. We will miss him.’
Editor of Granta, Sigrid Rausing, remembers Ian Jack.
The Stinky Ocean
‘It was a peculiar, alopecic landscape of hummocks and gullies, with patches of grass growing on what looked like white earth, and rarely a soul to be seen.’
Ian Jack on the slag heaps of Glasgow, and the aristocratic lives built on them.
Those Who Felt Differently
‘Could grief for one woman have caused all this? We were told so.’
Ian Jack in 1997 on the death of Diana.
The Best Picture He Ever Saw
‘Always and everywhere, this unequal struggle to preserve and remember.’
Ian Jack recalls the missing buildings of his hometown, Farnworth.
The 12.10 To Leeds
‘Outside wars and nuclear accidents, it is hard to think of any technological failure which has had such lasting and widespread effects.’
Ian Jack on the Hatfield train crash, from Granta 73.
