Gift
Perhentian Sunrise
published in
A story about romance. « The eve of a suitor’s arrival, bigger than Christmas or birthday, I tell you. »
The inborn germ
published in
Why death? Who or what dies? Philosophers tend not to explain, but to justify. When do such questions become biological questions? Does it help?
Flags & bones
published in
On Curzio Malaparte’s Europe — and ours. The midcentury novelist read anew, on war’s aftermath and transatlantic romance. What was, or is, « postwar Europe », anyway?
Gerard Croiset & the adventure of the psychic detective
published in
The clairvoyant Dutch grocer who charted the frontiers of parapsychology and lent a hand to the FBI. « Unbelievable but true! »
Skinned alive
published in
Imagine your therapist assigned you to write your autobiography, after which you decided you were cured, so your therapist published it as revenge. Zeno’s Conscience turns 99.
On Kafkaesque pedagogy
published in
Not the nightmare one might instinctively expect. Franz Kafka and Stig Dagerman on parenthood vs. educatorhood: who can educate a child?
An Unlucky Man
published in
« He rolled down the window, went back to honking the horn, and started waving my underpants out the window. »
How Americans edit sex out of my writing
published in
What is editing? Two people who both lead a literary life — an augmented reality where the connections between existence and sentences are investigated daily — wage sensual war for the soul of the page.
€ 0
published in
No one would have understood both the sentiment and the absurdity more keenly than Marx himself, whose face has adorned real currencies in more countries than anyone else’s, with the possible exception of Elizabeth II.