Short story collection by English author Hilary Mantel
Learning to Talk is the first short story collection by English author Hilary Mantel published in 2003 by Fourth Estate.
Stories
Most of the stories are narrated by an adult thinking about their childhoods, many of which echo Hilary Mantel's life[1]
- King Billy is a Gentleman (New Writing 1992, Minerva) - Liam's father has left and is replaced by a lodger, who now provides Liam's mother with his income. Then a family moves next door with two children, who antagonate Liam, revealing that Liam has an Irish Catholic background, bubbling under the sectarianism between the two families...
- Destroyed (Granta issue #63, 1998) - Her dog Victor died and was replaced by two puppies, Victor and Mike. The two dogs were very different as they grew up, but her family were not always truthful...
- Curved is the Line of Beauty (TLS #5157) - In 1962 the family (except the father) set off to Birmingham in Jack the lodger's car. Jack's friend Jacob was from Africa - the narrator had never met a black man. Then Jacob's niece Tabby arrived and the narrator went for a walk with her where they entered a scrapyard and were soon lost...
- Learning to Talk (The London Magazine, 1987) - The narrator moved from the Pennines to Cheshire where she took elocution lessons to tone down her northern accent. She never enjoyed the lessons but managed to pass her diploma...
- Third Floor Rising (The Times Magazine, 2000) - A mother and then her daughter worked in Affleck & Brown in Manchester.
- The Clean Slate (Woman & Home, 2001) - She visits her mother Veronica and reminisces about herself growing up in Derwent, Derbyshire, later submerged by the Ladybower Reservoir. She finds her mother's facts to be full of untruths and exaggerations...