The Spring Equinox 2026 is a sunny, breezy day on the Colchester Campus of Essex University, and the flag rope is rattling against the flagpole on the roof of the Albert Sloman Library. The author, translator and teacher Philip Terry and I find ourselves the sole occupants in an otherwise empty corridor off Essex University’s ‘Square 4’ — one of a series of more or less Brutalist pedestrian precincts daisy-chained up the hill on the university’s leafy Colchester campus. I’ve been visiting the university one day a week for the past few months to teach a couple of Creative Writing modules while a member of staff — the author Holly Pester — is away. Knowing we’d both be here, I’d suggested that perhaps we should record a quick interview. ‘Sure,’ says Philip, as we chat variously about the recent death of translator and Georges Perec biographer David Bellos, about the politician Enoch Powell once visiting the Essex University campus to read his poetry (Philip has unearthed a press clipping from a local newspaper), and about a divinatory quality in the writings of Italo Calvino.
I’m delighted to have interviewed the author, translator and Oulipo expert Philip Terry when our paths crossed at the University of Essex back in the spring. My interview – ‘Writing on the Verge of Prophecy’ —is today published by the great online literary journal Review31.
It was a fascinating conversaation, touching on translation, Oulipo, and Terry’s translations of Oulipian texts – enjoy!
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