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Claire-Louise Bennett
Claire-Louise Bennett grew up in Wiltshire and studied literature and drama at the University of Roehampton, before settling in Galway. Her short fiction and essays have been published in The Stinging Fly, The Penny Dreadful, The Moth, Colony, The Irish Times, The White Review and gorse. She was awarded the inaugural White Review Short Story Prize in 2013 and has received bursaries from the Arts Council and Galway City Council. Her debut novel, Pondwas published by Fitzcarraldo Editions in 2015 and shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize in 2016. Her second novel, Checkout 19, is published by Jonathan Cape in August 2021.

Articles Available Online


The Russian Man

Fiction

Issue No. 27

Claire-Louise Bennett

Fiction

Issue No. 27

Many years ago a large Russian man with the longest tendrils of the softest white hair came to live in the fastest growing town...

poetry

Issue No. 13

Morning, Noon & Night

Claire-Louise Bennett

poetry

Issue No. 13

Sometimes a banana with coffee is nice. It ought not to be too ripe – in fact there should...

4    It’s New Year’s Eve, I’m standing newly divorced on a roof in a town, we toast the rockets wobble on their way what a party what an opportunity, almost an imperative to think something and do something about what you’ve thought   I think   I’m here now   I think   What do I need   Consumption inspires strength of mind even though it’s mindless but that’s a bad sentence to start a new year with, even though it’s true   I need: new beginnings, new maxims, new year’s resolutions   Of others I know only that it sucks the life out of a human being never to say thank you and to thank too much you have to do your own thing, put yourself first   or precisely don’t think so much don’t follow your desires, but pursue them and hope you don’t turn into some kind of monster on the way a monster that pulls things off the shelves with a dead automation and is itself anderswo engagiert and moreover has been so for a long time a monster that rattles around with its shopping trolley   A new year’s resolution: Don’t listen to too much twaddle that separates you from yourself but that’s difficult to live up to that’s why you need a resolution   A new year’s resolution: Listen to much and many because you can’t know beforehand what you’re missing what you’ll miss due to prejudice and stupidity so let it be a new year’s resolution to be less prejudiced and lazy and stupid but that’s difficult to live up to   I’m here now in the midst of life   Life which like time shifts restlessly in the sofa but never goes away life which is the opposite of death and death which is a euphemism for somethingorother orgasm, happiness, peace at long last, some peace and quiet imagine! to be able to just lounge  in the big, silent house where only tiredness moves   A new year’s resolution: Try not to read everything as if it were entrails or coffee grounds try not to long for everything too much try not to apologise for everything the apology is like the thank you a stupid place to be conscripted fanaticism is so unbecoming   I speak to myself in the imperative: Remember! that everyone knows a handful of psychopaths who live their lives as though they were the only person in it these people aren’t capable of much apart from working and partying and

Contributor

August 2014

Claire-Louise Bennett

Contributor

August 2014

Claire-Louise Bennett grew up in Wiltshire and studied literature and drama at the University of Roehampton, before settling in...

The Lady of the House

fiction

Issue No. 8

Claire-Louise Bennett

fiction

Issue No. 8

Wow it’s so still. Isn’t it eerie. Oh yes. So calm. Everything’s still. That’s right. Look at the rowers – look at how fast...

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Interview

Issue No. 12

Interview with Yvonne Rainer

Orit Gat

Interview

Issue No. 12

TWO DAYS BEFORE WE WERE SCHEDULED TO MEET, Yvonne Rainer walked into the gallery I was looking after for...

Interview

October 2012

Interview with Sjón

Mary Hannity

Interview

October 2012

In Iceland, they eat puffin. The best-tasting puffin is soaked overnight in milk. ‘Then give the milk to the...

fiction

March 2017

Snow

Hoda Barakat

TR. Marilyn Booth

fiction

March 2017

Hoda Barakat’s The Kingdom of this Earth turns to the history of Lebanese Maronite Christians, from the Mandate period...

 

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