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← Back to all issuesGranta 167: Extraction
Spring 2024
From mining to Bitcoin, energy politics to psychoanalysis, the spring edition examines a practice as old as human history: Extraction.
In this issue James Pogue is detained in the Central African Republic, where mines and mercenaries are at the centre of governmental conflict, Nuar Alsadir analyses boredom, Bathsheba Demuth travels the Yukon River and Laleh Khalili unravels the history of energy in Israel.
Elsewhere, Anjan Sundaram reports from Mexico, Thea Riofrancos discusses the green transition and William Atkins visits the Forest of Dean, with photography by Tereza Červeňová.
And in fiction, we have new work by Carlos Fonseca (tr. Jessica Sequeira), Camilla Grudova, Benjamin Kunkel, Eka Kurniawan (tr. Annie Tucker) Rachel Kushner and Christian Lorentzen.
Plus, photography by Danny Franzreb (introduced by Atossa Araxia Abrahamian) and Salvatore Vitale.
Cover artwork © Salvatore Vitale
From this Issue
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Wagner in Africa
James Pogue
‘Many people in the country seem happy to accept mercenaries in exchange for stability.’
James Pogue on the Wagner Group in the Central African Republic.
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Prairie Dogs
Benjamin Kunkel
‘After making sure our guests all had the drinks and/or drugs they required, I put on a Sun Ra record.’
A short story by Benjamin Kunkel.
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Working the Soil and the Cloud
Danny Franzreb & Atossa Araxia Abrahamian
‘Like all money, Bitcoin is valuable only to the degree that people believe in its value.’
Photography by Danny Franzreb, introduced by Atossa Araxia Abrahamian.
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Where the Language Changes
Bathsheba Demuth
‘I am on the hunt for the Russian Empire, or what traces might still exist of its colonial enterprise.’
Bathsheba Demuth travels the Yukon river, following the history of the fur trade and the Nulato massacre.
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The Extracted Earth
Thea Riofrancos
‘It’s perhaps hard to imagine a country with abundant mineral or oil reserves simply leaving that wealth underground. But there are precedents here, historical and contemporary.’
Granta interviews Thea Riofrancos.
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Monkey Army
Eka Kurniawan
‘He did what people told him to do. He was a machine.’
A short story by Eka Kurniawan, translated by Annie Tucker.
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The Last Freeminers of England
William Atkins & Tereza Červeňová
‘It is a principle of freemining that you leave nothing of value on site, nothing other than the mine itself, which is of value only to a freeminer.’
William Atkins visits the Forest of Dean, with photography by Tereza Červeňová.
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Drone Wars for Mexico’s Gold Mountains
Anjan Sundaram
‘More than 111,000 people have gone missing in Mexico in the past six years.’
Anjan Sundaram on cartels, conflict and the rate of disappearances in Mexico.
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The True Depth of a Cave
Rachel Kushner
‘When you live underground, among the things you discover is that you are not alone.’
Fiction by Rachel Kushner.
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Nettle Tea
Camilla Grudova
‘“Love is a matter of yeast,” he said.’
A story by Camilla Grudova.
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The Accursed Mountains
Christian Lorentzen
‘The heart was something that healed, but the best you could do with a broken tooth was to keep it in your pocket.’
Christian Lorentzen on tooth extraction.
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As They Laid Down Their Cables
Laleh Khalili
‘The Eilat–Ashkelon pipeline went into operation in 1969, on the eve of the nationalisation of oil.’
Laleh Khalili on energy politics and the ‘secret’ pipeline transporting crude oil across southern Israel.
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The Darién Gap
Carlos Fonseca
‘He thinks of himself as a man who has learned to be white by living among white people, though all it takes is a look in the mirror to realize his error.’
Fiction by Carlos Fonseca, translated by Jessica Sequeira.
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On Boredom
Nuar Alsadir
‘Boredom is a complicated stink of an emotion, one that is far more layered than we presume.’
Nuar Alsadir on boredom.
