MARIA DUARTE is swept along by the cocky self-belief of a ping-pong hustler in a surprisingly violent drama
Latest editorial
Letters from Latin America: Literature, poetry and politics
Women writers fearlessly tackle the brutal histories of Brazil and El Salvador, national identity and family conflict
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
CAROLYN FORCHE’S What You Have Heard Is True (Allen Lane, £25) is an electrifying memoir in which the acclaimed US poet tells how she became an activist in El Salvador during the late 1970s and early 1980s.
Forche’s was a trial by fire. She recounts how, as a 27- year-old poet and young teacher living in southern California, she became involved in El Salvador’s civil war through her contact with Leonel Gomez, nephew of Salvadorian poet Claribel Alegria.
Similar stories
Ben Cowles speaks with IAN ‘TREE’ ROBINSON and ANDY DAVIES, two of the string pullers behind the Manchester Punk Festival, ahead of its 10th year show later this month
CAROLINE FOWLER explains how the slave trade helped establish the ‘golden age’ of Dutch painting and where to find its hidden traces
The Morning Star sorts the good eggs from the rotten scoundrels of the year
