In the sweet shop Willy Chapman was free, absolved from all responsibility, and he ran his sweet shop like his life — quietly, steadfastly, devotedly. It was a bargain struck between Chapman and his beautiful, emotionally injured wife — a bargain based on unexpressed, inexpressible love and on a courageous acceptance of life's deprivation... threatened only by Dorry, their clever, angry, unforgiving daughter.

'Perfectly controlled, superbly written. Waterland is original, compelling and narration of the highest order' Guardian In the years since its first publication, in 1983, Waterland has established itself as one of the classics of twentieth-century British literature: a visionary tale of England's Fen country; a sinuous meditation on the workings of history; and a family story startling in its detail and universal in its reach. This edition includes an introduction, by the author, written to celebrate the book's 25th anniversary. 'Graham Swift has mapped his Waterland like a new Wessex. He appropriates the Fens as Moby Dick did whaling or Wuthering Heights the moors. This is a beautiful, serious and intelligent novel, admirably ambitious and original' Observer 'A 300-page tour de force... A burst of exuberant fictive energy' Evening Standard 'Waterland is a formidably intelligent book, animated by an impressive, angry pity at what human creatures are capable of doing to one another in the name of love and need. The most powerful novel I have read for some time' New York Review of Books.

This highly personal book is a singular and open-spirited account of a writer's life. It has evolved entirely with its author, bringing pieces from various stages of Graham Swift's career together with new essays, observations, poetry and interviews. Swift writes about the intimacy of playing the guitar and the perils of reading in public; of the pleasures of spending time with Ishiguro and Rushdie or sharing a private moment with Montaigne; of youthful adventures in Greece, the experience of Czechoslovakia mid-Velvet Revolution, and of the rich material offered on his very own doorstep by the district of London in which he lives, walks and works. Making an Elephant is a book of encounters, between the writer and his younger selves, father and son, present and past, author and director, reader and the page — and between friends. Full of life, charm and candour, it illustrates and celebrates the layers of experience, history and interpretation that inform not only the process of writing, but also shape the writer himself.