Granta #175
145 x 210 mm, 320 pages
London, UK
Editor: Thomas Meaney
Design: Daniela Silva
Publisher: Sigrid Rausing
From Nobel laureates to debut novelists, international translations to investigative journalism, each themed issue of Granta turns the attention of the world’s best writers on to one aspect of the way we live now.
‘Scandinavia’ is the theme of this issue, with editor Thomas Meaney asking: ‘What sets Scandinavian literature apart from the rest of European literature?’. The answer is to be found in the featured texts, which reveal a formative ‘lateness’ distinct to the region’s history and culture. Inside, discover six small-town, rural stories by Danish author Helle Helle, as well as fiction by former elite handball player Malte Tellerup, centred on an unfolding eco-activist plot requiring vast quantities of fertiliser. Elsewhere, in the issue’s non-fiction offerings, Finnish writer Eva Kilpi’s ‘A Woman’s Diary’ chronicles 1978 through intimate diary entries shaped by the demands of motherhood, while the diary excerpts of Swedish writer Lars Norén are translated in English for the first time with nothing left out—‘he records it all, typing and compulsively smoking in bare rooms’.
Plus, further contributions from the likes of Jon Fosse, Vigdis Hjorth, Olga Ravn, Karl Ove Knausgård and Solvej Balle.