Reviews of Habibi Funk 031, Kayatibu, and The Good Ones
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Singing about the dark times
CHILE DEMANDS: 'Until dignity is customary'
[Carlos Figueroa/CC]
SIMON DUFF relishes the cross contamination of Damien Hirst’s greatest hits by street artists from France and the US
In view of the grooming gangs inquiry, SIMON PARSONS feels the relevance of this powerful examination of trauma suffered at Medomsley Youth Detention Centre
JOHN GREEN doubts the motivations of a US war photographer who never questions why, or for whom, she is producing images of imperialist conflict
MARIA DUARTE reviews Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere, Hedda, The Mastermind, and Regretting You
TONY CONWAY welcomes a thrilling and concise history of Hope not Hate, that is also a manual full of tactical advice
PAUL DONOVAN welcomes an inspiring account of living with deafness that has important lessons for the treatment of deaf people in today’s UK
“IN THE dark times will there be singing?” Bertolt Brecht famously asked when he was in exile. His answer was that “there will be singing about the dark times.” Here are four strong new collections about the dark times in which we now find ourselves.
Mike Jenkins (ed) Gwrthryfel/Uprising (Culture Matters, £12) is a fantastic collection of radical poetry from contemporary Wales. There are almost 80 poems here, in English and Welsh, including some great poems by Sheenagh Pugh, Des Mannay, Alun Rees, Christopher Meredith, Tracey Rhys, Annest Gwilym (Wales for Sale) and Anne Phillips (We are a proud nation of call centres).
It is a collection of poems about violence – against the poor, against women, against language, against common decency, against Nature. In Gelliwastad Ablaze Dyfan Lewis watches the summer-dry gorse burn one night above Swansea:
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ALAN MORRISON hears the tradition of English Modernism in an unusually accomplished debut volume of poetry
LEO BOIX selects the best books of fiction, poetry, and non-fiction written by Latinx and Latin American authors published this year
MEIC BIRTWHISTLE speaks to David Constantine about the fascination he shares with Brecht for the material exactness of Greek poetry