Photograph by John Minihan.
Toby Litt is an English writer of short stories, novels, diaries. He’s the editor of MIR Online and of the Writers Rebel website.
Toby is best-known for writing his books – from Adventures in Capitalism to (so far) Patience – in alphabetical order (apart from the non-fiction ones); he is currently working on Q and R.
Toby’s story ‘The Retreat’ won the brand new 2020 Short Fiction/ University of Essex Prize, his story ‘John & John’ came first in the semi-widely-known Manchester Fiction Prize, and his story ‘Call it “The Bug” Because I Have No Time To Think of a Better Title” was shortlisted for the notoriously lucrative Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award.
His latest novel, Patience, was published by Galley Beggar Press in September 2019. It was shortlisted for the Republic of Consciousness Prize. You can read an excerpt here. And buy it here.
Wrestliana, Toby’s family memoir about being a man, fighting and losing, was published by Galley Beggar Press on May 1st 2018. You can read an excerpt here.
In May 2014, Toby’s first opera collaboration, Vastation (Nichtung), with music by Samy Moussa, was performed in Munich and Regensberg.
Also in 2014, Toby wrote a monthly comic – Dead Boy Detectives – based on characters from Neil Gaiman’s Sandman. This was published by Vertigo. The Dead Boy Detectives TV series, featuring Toby and Mark Buckingham’s character Crystal Palace, is now in production for HBO Max.
In 2017, Vertigo issued the trade paperback edition of Free Country: A Tale from the Children’s Crusade. This was Toby’s completion a Neil Gaiman graphic novel.
Toby writes songs and song cycles (Befalling, Life Cycle, Rest) with Emily Hall. The scores of these are available from her shop. His other musical collaborations are on this Spotify playlist.
Toby is Reader in Creative Writing at Birkbeck College, London.
He’s on – Twitter (@tobylitt), Facebook, Instagram, goodreads, Academia.edu.
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