Niall Griffiths, Grits

Laura Nee (Cardiff University)

Ed. by Cristina Sandru, The Literary Encyclopedia
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.2: Welsh Writing and Culture, 400-present.
Vol. editors: Kirsti Bohata (Swansea University), Nicholas Seager (University of Keele), Rita Singer (Aberystwyth University)

Dates

First circulation or publication 2000

Places

England (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

Niall Griffiths debut novel Grits (2000) is a vernacular tale of alcoholics, drug addicts and drifters from across the UK, who come together in the seaside town of Aberwystwyth. It is also largely autobiographical. As a young man, Griffiths moved to Aberystwyth to research his PhD in post-war British poetry, but soon became, as he puts it, an “enthusiastic participator in parties”. After indulging in a series of drug and alcohol fuelled binges, however, Griffiths found he could not remember anything – yet, strangely enough, it was this element of forgetting that prompted the process of writing:

If you go on these binges sometimes you reach these bright and shining places, where great witticisms roll …

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803 words

Citation: Nee, Laura. "Grits". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 23 June 2008 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=22020, accessed 22 November 2024.]

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