‘Not just important, but interesting’: An Interview with The Editor
By Arwyn Clayton, Elodie Edwards, Zoe Lidbury and Bernadette O’Hara
Edited by Naomi Adam
Last week, The Letters Page web team revisited the history of the journal. This time, we’ve asked editor-in-chief Jon McGregor for his own recollections on its development.
Sitting down with Jon, we are intrigued to learn what drew him to the epistolary theme in the first place. He remarks:
It’s not so much that letters are important, as interesting. There’s more information in a letter that comes in the post – it’s an object that’s moved through space to get to you.
The tangibility of the physical letters we receive reinforces the need for careful handling. ‘All of the letters have been archived in the university archives’, Jon notes, recalling that ‘we had to take lots of steps to make sure we kept the right letters in the right envelopes, and weren’t too casual with them.’ Jon considers the letters historic, referring to them as ‘social documents’. He highlights the physicality of the letter-writing process, with the paper used and the handwriting idiosyncrasies that are lost in digital communication.
Over the years, The Letters Page has received many submissions from both established and amateur writers. Jon expresses his honour and delight when receiving letters from professional authors, busy as they must be. ‘In the second issue, we had a letter from George Saunders, who’s one of my favourite authors – that was really exciting.’ He continues to list Naomi Alderman and Kevin Barry, past contributors to the journal, as other particularly memorable correspondents. Modestly, Jon confides that ‘if I was running a short story magazine, or a poetry magazine, they wouldn’t have sent anything. But, to them, writing a letter felt almost like a spare-time thing.’ Smiling, he then wonders whether ‘the dream authors are the ones that I don’t necessarily know about yet.’
We ask if any individual letter had particularly stood out to Jon over the years. He observes:
In the early days, people got very imaginative about the format of the letter. We had a letter that was rolled up and put in a bottle, we had a letter on an enormous flag that came in the post.
Among such creative correspondence, other letters that have particularly left their mark are those from recurring writers. Jon speaks fondly of ‘a retired lorry driver, who clearly didn’t think of himself as a writer – wasn’t trying to be a writer – just wrote really nice, interesting letters’ and offers a special mention to Rolf Venner, perhaps ‘our number one fan’ who ‘writes to us, probably 4 or 5 times a year – and it’s always nice to get a letter from him.’
With such a wealth of past inspiration, we wonder what Jon himself would write to The Letters Page about. After a moment of deliberation, inspiration strikes – ‘I would use it as an excuse to travel. I’d book a trip somewhere and write a letter along the way. Partly because some of the best letters we’ve had have been based around travel.’ He continues:
A letter carries with it that trace of the journey – both the journey that the letter takes, but also the journey that the writer is on, there’s something that fits the medium.
In the vein of writing from across the globe, Jon is eager to discuss the upcoming volume of The Letters Page, which will be released in collaboration with Nottingham UNESCO City of Literature and feature commissioned writers based in other Cities of Literature. ‘All the letters have come from people writing in other languages and that’s been extremely exciting. I think I would really relish getting more letters from people in other languages, finding translators and working through that whole process’, Jon reveals.
The anthology will be published in December 2025. Nottingham City of Literature is hosting a launch gala on the 1st December, with tickets available here (all profits will contribute towards next year’s Big City Reads campaign).
Think you’re the dream author Jon doesn’t know about yet? The Letters Page team are back in the office, and ready to read your real letters again. We publish stories, essays, poems, memoir, reportage, criticism, recipes, travelogues, and any hybrid forms, so long as they come to us in the form of a letter. We are looking for writers of all nationalities and ages, both established and emerging.
Your letter must be sent in the post, to:
The Letters Page, School of English, University of Nottingham, NG7 2RD, UK
See our submissions page for more information.
theletters.page 