Coventry | Rachel Cusk | Granta Magazine

<img decoding="async" src="https://litbreaker.nui.media/pipeline/517985/0/vc?z=litbreaker&dim=514838,514839&kw=&click=" alt="" width="" height="" border="0" /> ‘War is a narrative: it might almost be said to embody the narrative principle itself.’ E very so often, for offences actual or hypothetical, my mother and father stop speaking to me. There’s a funny phrase for this phenomenon in England: it’s called being sent to Coventry. I don’t know what the origins of the expression are, though I suppose I could easily find out. Coventry suffered badly in the war: it once had a beautiful cathedral that in 1940 was bombed into non-existence. Now it’s an ordinary town in the Midlands, and if it hasn’t made sense of its losses, it has at least survived them. Sometimes it takes me a while to notice that my parents have sent me to Coventry. It’s not unlike when a central-heating boiler breaks down: there’s no explosion, no dramatic sight or sound, merely a growing feeling of discomfo

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