Does Hope Have Feathers?

Max Porter's debut novel, "Grief Is the Thing With Feathers", on its 10th anniversary.

1.

Once upon a time, there was a myth. This myth may have been the first of its kind, or maybe it’s always existed, in a perpetual state of transformation. It began (if it began at all) like this:

A thing is what it is, until it becomes what it was not.

This story became:

A blind visionary upset a goddess who changed him into a woman. Seven years later, she became he again, because change is constant.

The story also became:

There was a beautiful man that a nymph wished to be united with forever. As a result, they were fused into one body, because obsession is all-consuming.

Another version has a young woman pursued by lust, begging the gods, “Give me aid!” Her arms grow downy feathers, and she soars into the air as a crow. The girl who can fly is now free. “Hope,” we are told by a later poet, “is the thing with feathers.” An even later writer transmutes “Hope” in the title of a book to “Grief”.

Change is at the centre of these stories and in the fabric of their structures. It’s in the nature …