I love it when you discover a new writer, one who really makes you think about what writing can do. I seem to remember Jeanette Winterson saying in an interview somewhere, that most books are television these days. Well, Worlds from the Word’s End by Joanna Walsh certainly isn’t, unless you imagine it as a television being dropped on your head.
A fellow poet leant me this book last week and as I hadn’t got much reading time, I nearly put it to one side. I’m so glad I didn’t.
Worlds from the Word’s End is a collection of short stories that play with words and meaning, that push ideas further than you think they can go, that surprise you at every end and turn and force you out of your comfort zone. As a writer, one thing I really value is a piece of work, whether it’s a single poem or a whole book, that makes you want to pick up your pen and write. Joanna Walsh’s stories do exactly that. They spark ideas, partly, I suspect, because they have this exuberant sense of freedom about them, not only in terms of subject matter but also in terms of style.
It doesn’t matter if you’re a poet or a prose writer; you need to read in order to write. The thing is, what works for one person doesn’t necessarily work for another. Thus, you stumble from one book to another without finding inspiration, even though the books you’re reading are highly recommended. Then something comes along, something you don’t expect much from, and it gives you a jolt. That’s what this book has done for me. I’m set to order another of Walsh’s books on the strength of having read Worlds from the Word’s End and I’m immensely grateful to my writer friend for giving me precisely the book I needed.
I’ve included some reviews from Walsh’s website below, and it’s also worth pointing out that the publisher is the Sheffield-based And Other Stories who are committed to publishing new and experimental writing: ‘We aim to push people’s reading limits and help them discover authors of adventurous and inspiring writing.’ They also run the Northern Book Prize which I can only dream of entering as my draft remains in the bottom drawer at the moment. They require the full manuscript by December for this year’s competition in case you’re interested.
‘Joanna Walsh is clever, funny and merciless. She abducts people from their apparently normal lives and confronts them with the fact that dystopia is not a place in the future but a room in their own house.’ Yuri Herrera
‘Terrifyingly perceptive, subversively hilarious – these stories are part Daniil Kharms, part-Lydia Davis – while also managing to be singularly Joanna Walsh; how her writing always manages to make everything else I read (and write) seem specious and frivolous.’ Sara Baume
‘Worlds from the Word’s End is an anti-mainstream collection. Joanna Walsh’s thick, blurred and claustrophobic worlds deal with deconstruction, estrangement, silence and the disappearance of common language. This is unconventional writing that is going to enchant unconventional readers.’ Dubravka Ugrešić
Julie Mellor - poet 