MARIA DUARTE is swept along by the cocky self-belief of a ping-pong hustler in a surprisingly violent drama
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A lyrical evocation of pre-industrial Calderdale
END OF AN EPOCH: The earliest known image of a cotton mill dates to 1746. Mills like this one - converted from a corn mill in Northampton - proliferated through the valleys of Calderdale
[Public Domain]
STEVE ANDREW recommends a lively and often moving guide to once vibrant spaces that have been abandoned or swept away
GEOFF BOTTOMS appreciates the local touch brought to a production of Dickens’s perennial classic
MARY CONWAY is disappointed by a production whose design and cartoonish acting overwhelms the close scrutiny of characters
SUSAN DARLINGTON enjoys the raucous familiarity of a traditional topsy-turvy pantomime
RON JACOBS introduces the latest novel by the best writer of US working-class fiction writing today
Where the Skylark Sings
By Lee Garratt
Dimensionfold Publishing, £12.99
IN THIS slim novel, Lee Garratt takes us on a historical journey through the hills and valleys of Calderdale in Yorkshire and introduces us to the people who lived there.
He begins in 1790, and through the lives of one weaving family, he charts the devastating destruction of the old-style cottage weaving industry with the coming of mass production mills during the late 1700s and early 1800s.
Despite the attempts of the cottage weaving families in the area to prevent the mills destroying their livelihoods and way of life, the inexorable march of the wealthy mill owners is relentless.
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