Freeman's Conclusions
By (Author) John Freeman
Atlantic Books
Grove Press
21st November 2023
7th September 2023
Main
United Kingdom
General
Non Fiction
Narrative theme: Displacement, exile, migration
Modern and contemporary fiction: general and literary
Paperback
336
Width 140mm, Height 210mm, Spine 25mm
420g
Over the course of ten years, Freeman's has introduced the English-speaking world to countless writers of international import and acclaim, from Olga Tokarczuk to Valeria Luiselli, while also spotlighting brilliant writers working in English, from Tommy Orange to Tess Gunty. Now, in its last issue, this unique literary project ponders all the ways of reaching a fitting conclusion.
For Sayaka Murata, keeping up with the comings and goings of fashion and its changing emotional landscapes can mean being left behind, and in her poem 'Amenorrhea' Julia Alverez experiences the end of the line as menopause takes hold. Yet sometimes an end is merely a beginning, as Barry Lopez meditates while walking through the snowy Oregonian landscapes. While Chinelo Okparanta's story 'Fatu' confronts the end of a relationship under the spectre of new life, other writers look towards aging as an opportunity for rebirth, such as Honore Fanonne Jeffers, who takes on the role of being her own elder, comforting herself in the ways that her grandmother used to. Finally, in his comic story 'Everyone at Dinner Has a Max Von Sydow Story,' Dave Eggers suggests that sometimes stories don't have neat or clean endings - that sometimes the middle is enough.
With new writing from Sandra Cisneros, Colum McCann, Omar El Akkad and Mieko Kawakami, Freeman's: Conclusions is a testament to the startling power of literature to conclude in a state of beauty, fear and promise.
The definitive issue of a venerated literary journal...Filled with expertly crafted stories, essays, and poems, this volume is a triumph * Kirkus Reviews (starred review) *
John Freeman was the editor of Granta until 2013. His books include Dictionary of the Undoing, How to Read a Novelist, Tales of Two Americas and Tales of Two Planets. His poetry includes the collections Maps, The Park and Wind, Trees. In 2021, he edited the anthologies There's a Revolution Outside, My Love with Tracy K. Smith and The Penguin Book of the Modern American Short Story. An executive editor at Knopf, his work has appeared in the New Yorker and the Paris Review and has been translated into twenty-two languages.