Ashleigh Young is a writer and editor of essays and poetry currently living in London. Her first book of poems, Magnificent Moon (Victoria University Press), was published in 2012, and in 2009 she was awarded the Adam Prize for her essay collection Can You Tolerate This? In this interview she speaks about digression, isolation and the process of writing her essay ‘Sea of trees‘, which addresses the Japanese phenomenon of hikikomori and the ways interior and exterior geographies can intertwine.