What we do

Novelist Daniel Alarcón writes of a certain anxiousness about whether or not his novel had been “pirated” in Peru, where busy counterfeit publishers have undercut the legitimate publishing industry to the point of death. On the one hand, he won’t get royalties from pirated copies; on the other, it means he’s “arrived” if the demand justifies stealing his work. Granta, “The Magazine of New Writing,” would also be justified in calling itself “The Magazine of Good Writing,” and this issue examines what we do (Alarcón’s book pirates, a veterinarian in West Africa, a hospice worker and farmers turned soldiers in Rwanda, for starters). Add in Salman Rushdie writing on sloth and new fiction from Jim Crace and Joshua Ferris, and you’ve got a volume worth the time and money. It’ll make you think a bit about what you do.