GORDON PARSONS recommends an ideal introduction to the writer who was first to give the English a literary language

GORDON PARSONS welcomes a graphic biography of George Sand, the most popular French novelist in 19th-century Britain

GORDON PARSONS relishes a fast moving production of Sheridan’s comic masterpiece

GORDON PARSONS relishes a play that reveals how language carries much more than simple communication

GORDON PARSONS appreciates a very necessary exploration of the benefit of knowing more than one language

GORDON PARSONS witnesses a production committed to great fun but signifying nothing 

GORDON PARSONS is underwhelmed by the inflation of a petty war into the undeserved status of epic

GORDON PARSONS wonders at a near perfect production of Shakespeare’s eloquent fairytale

GORDON PARSONS enjoys the tale of a self-emancipating woman told with deceptive simplicity

Uniformity of ‘talking heads’ presentation annihilates all possibility of conveying the true drama inherent in the play, suggests GORDON PARSONS

GORDON PARSONS recommends a book that will keep the reader, black or white, fully engaged and, as importantly, self-questioning

GORDON PARSONS recommends a production that makes no demands other than being entertained

GORDON PARSONS on a thought-provoking reflection on our out of joint times and a warning that there is no escape into the past

On stage the intriguing Splinter of Ice, eccentricity of Wuthering Heights and a revival of the Living Newspaper tradition absorbed just as much as the graphic novel The Dancing Plague, Ariel Dorfman’s The Compensation Bureau or Mario Vargas Llosa’s Harsh Times

A cautionary melodrama that hits the right notes in articulating the realities of class-ridden society with omnipresent violence against women, writes GORDON PARSONS

Narratives from detained refugees who exist in a virtual lawless world with no fixed sentences

GORDON PARSONS recommends an excellent theatrical tribute to nursing staff

Research into the lost plays of the Shakespearean period provides new insights into the Bard and his work, says GORDON PARSONS

Engrossing drama of Moscow meeting between Soviet spy Kim Philby and novelist Graham Greene

GORDON PARSONS recommends a sharply satirical take on what awaits us after the pandemic ends

Succinct account of colonialism’s history of blood, cruelty and greed

Resonant accounts of the impact of the pandemic on the black community

Enlightening overview of a literary pioneer

Remarkable exploration of how we construct our sense of belonging

Virus of racism diagnosed in acute commentaries on pandemic

Levy’s compendium is as concerned with the legacy of the Vietnam War on the hapless vets, trying to live in a society which responded with the standard ‘thank you for your service’

On the eve of France’s 1940 surrender an intriguing gathering takes place at Gertrude Stein and Alice Toklas’s renowned Paris salon

Lockdown diversions from the heart of Scotland

Intriguing account of Lenin's time in London

Timely revival of play on Chinese dissident

Hospital drama from 2014 resonates at a time of NHS crisis

Powerful reminder of the war against the miners in 1984-85

Ingenious whistleblower drama from Mike Bartlett now online

Ingenious reworking of Dr Faustus less than the sum of its parts

Radical demystification of Daniel Defoe’s iconic work

Timely reminder of Labour Party founder's vision

John Kani's Kunene and the King, set in post-apartheid South Africa, was a highlight of the year

Essays on the role of intellectuals in a conflicted contemporary world

Hannah Khalil’s ambitious new play suffers from information overload

Magisterial biography of Marx's early life and times

Director's cut Shakespeare sacrifices coherence for chaos