We live today in constant motion, traveling distances rapidly, small
ones daily, arriving in new states. In this inaugural edition of
Freeman's, a new biannual of unpublished writing, former Granta
editor and NBCC president John Freeman brings together the best new
fiction, nonfiction, and poetry about that electrifying moment when we
arrive.
Strange encounters abound. David Mitchell meets a ghost in Hiroshima
Prefecture; Lydia Davis recounts her travels in the exotic territory of
the Norwegian language; and in a Dave Eggers story, an elderly gentleman
cannot remember why he brought a fork to a wedding. End points often
turn out to be new beginnings. Louise Erdrich visits a Native American
cemetery that celebrates the next journey, and in a Haruki Murakami
story, an aging actor arrives back in his true self after performing a
role, discovering he has changed, becoming a new person.
Featuring startling new fiction by Laura van den Berg, Helen Simpson,
and Tahmima Anam, as well as stirring essays by Aleksandar Hemon, Barry
Lopez, and Garnette Cadogan, who relearned how to walk while being black
upon arriving in NYC, Freeman's announces the arrival of an essential
map to the best new writing in the world.