‘Can a bunch of cis men make a responsible and meaningful movie about a woman’s struggle to liberate herself from the patriarchy?’

‘Naively, I did not expect shaving my head to be a big deal.’

‘You still experience that feeling of self-consciousness that pricks you every time you slip into leggings and tank tops.’

‘Forget about aliens and spaceships for a moment; the truth of the capability of human beings to commit monstrous acts is here, right now.’

‘My gay imposter syndrome and writing imposter syndrome are always competing to take up more headspace.’

‘Sometimes, I would like to just post the fucking photo. Without overthinking it.’

‘I fear being labeled a problem patient.’

‘The myth that girls mature quicker gets passed down, travelling through the veins of father to son, uncle to nephew.’

‘Sometimes I ask myself if I put on women’s clothes to hide the macho underneath. Am I a wolf in sheep’s clothing or just a man in a dress?’

“I just knew there had to be others like me out there.” An interview with Zoë Noble, founder of ‘We Are Childfree’

Our editor shares the ten podcasts that have got her through the year.

‘The pedestal I imagined Sherman Alexie to stand on imploded, and for a moment, I felt just as naïve as I had some years back when I stepped foot into Mexico.’

‘Under the strain of financial hardship, enforced togetherness and the lack of circuit breakers usually provided by the outside world, many relationships have imploded.’

Mieko Kawakami’s latest novel is a richly-textured exploration of the choices we make as women, and the choices that are sometimes made for us – or taken away from us.

‘Shiv Roy was born swimming upstream. This is the only world she knows; one in which being a woman with opinions places you low on the food chain.’

There are alternative ways to honour the patron saint of lovers

A modern classical composer changing the way we consume music

A story of matriarchal tradition set against the backdrop of rural India

Mieko Kawakami’s protest novel against the sexist status quo of Japanese fiction

Yoko Ogawa’s dreamy, loose-flowing novel touches us in unexpected ways