In January 2022 Graham Swift’s short story “Fireworks” was published in the
New Yorker. Best known for
Last Orders(1996), which remains the only one of Swift’s novels to have been awarded the Booker prize, and for
Waterland(1983), which may be this author’s most popular work, Swift rarely publishes an isolated short story. Like the story “Blushes” published in the same American weekly a year earlier, the 2700-word “Fireworks” relates childhood memories to a present fraught with crisis and the dread of death on a global scale. Nevertheless, both stories are quietly optimistic, focusing on male protagonists who are survivors; relishing small aspects of daily life allows these men to maintain hope. Thus, as Swift notes in the interview which accompanies the short story…
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Citation: Logotheti, Anastasia. ""Fireworks"". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 25 February 2022 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=40709, accessed 28 April 2024.]
