Dear George Orwell,
Why do we write? Given that words and reality, as you once put it, are so often « no liker » to each other « than chessmen to living beings ».
I’m writing to you now from a future no-one could have seen coming –– except maybe yourself, and H G Wells, and J G Ballard and the furthest-seeing writers over the centuries from Sophocles to Margaret Atwood.
Because everything you wrote gifts us with the knowledge that words are the chesspieces by which the powers that be will play their games with our lives. You know, as the current UK Prime Minister puts it, that « human beings are creatures of the imagination », that « people live by narrative ».
Online, pigeon water is what we swim in and slather on ourselves.
The great storm surge is coming, it has always been coming in the borderland between Denmark and Germany. Here, Danish writer Dorthe Nors visits the Frisian Wadden Sea island of Sylt, as part of her travels along the North Sea coast.
The great storm surge is coming, it has always been coming in the borderland between Denmark and Germany. Here, Danish writer Dorthe Nors visits the Frisian Wadden Sea island of Sylt, as part of her travels along the North Sea coast.
Ramallah, downtown, fifth floor. The phone rings and the caller’s number appears on the screen. It’s an unknown number. And yet a call that comes at this hour must be answered.
رام الله، وسط البلد، الطابق الخامس. يرن الهاتف ويظهر رقم المتّصل على الشاشة. إنه ليس لأحد معارفنا، فالرقم غير معروف. مع ذلك، يتطلّبُ اتصال هاتفي في ساعة مبكِّرةٍ كهذه الردَّ عليه.