I cite this as evidence of the longevity of my connection with the magazine, but in fact the link goes back even further, pre-dating the acquisition of the missing Granta 1. In 1979 I was living in Oxford trying to finish a doctoral thesis and teaching in various Oxford colleges as a jobbing lecturer. I had just had my first novel accepted by a London publisher, but I was going to have to wait until January 1981 to see it published. I was reviewing books, writing short stories, and was seized with a sense of being engaged with literary life in a way that I haven’t fully replicated since. I read everything. I bought all the little magazines. Nothing stirred in the undergrowth of the literary world that didn’t attract my beady-eyed attention. At the same time, Susan, my wife, was working at Oxford University Press, running the publicity and marketing for the English Literature and Oxford Poetry lists. One night she came home from work with news of a new literary magazine that was starting up: she had met the editor, some American guy, who was looking for advertising, and she had decided to take a page in support.