The totally true storytelling club returned for JBW 2011. We selected some of our favourite writers who revealed true moments of beauty, awkwardness, tragedy and hilarity all packaged in 10-minute stories and told with no notes. JBW 2011 theme was ‘Close Call’.

‘Literature isn’t a moral beauty contest’, claimed Roth, ‘The belief it inspires is what counts.’ Literary titan and multi-award winning writer, Philip Roth was undoubtedly a brilliant, if controversial, artist. In a career that spanned 50 years he wrote numerous, generation-changing books, from his first, Goodbye, Columbus, to his last, Nemesis. Three outstanding writers discuss his work and his legacy.

Paul Essinger, a tennis professional in his 30s, is about to play his final US Open. The bookies give him 1,200-1 odds on winning the title. Anxiety-ridden, comically unaware and boiling with tension, each member of the Essinger family — Paul included — is painfully trying to unpick an idea of themselves from the tableau of upper-middle-class life they present. Reflecting on their German-Jewish ancestry, Essinger senior ruefully ascribes their good fortune to ‘immigrants’ luc...