Latest editorial
GEOFF BOTTOMS relishes a profoundly human portrait of a family as it evolves across 55 years in Sheffield
Potent political messages to a radical man of letters
PAUL DONOVAN applauds an excellently crafted new musical that explores the life and death of Ruth Ellis
PAUL DONOVAN is tickled by the excruciating take-downs of one of the funniest, wittiest, political writers around.
RON JACOBS points out, via a transcription of Kissinger’s secret recordings, that Trump could never have existed without Nixon and Kissinger
ELLIS RAE is persuaded that the advantages of the ‘talking cure’ are superior to the treatment of mental illness with drugs
JOHN GREEN, MICHAL BONCZA and BELLA KATZ review The Good Boy, Broken English, and Don't Be Prey
Letters to Randall Swingler
by Andy Croft
(Shoestring Press, £10)
THE OTTAVA rima is a rhyming stanza used in the past by poets such as Sir Thomas Wyatt, Lord Byron and WB Yeats and, fittingly, it's been chosen by prolific poet, editor and publisher Andy Croft for his latest poetry collection Letters to Randall Swingler.
A brilliant exercise in political discourse, wit and irony, it's a book written out of Croft’s profound desire to establish a poetic dialogue with Swingler (1900-1967), the largely forgotten novelist, poet, playwright, librettist and editor of radical literary magazines such as Left Review, Poetry and People, Our Time, Arena and Circus.
Similar stories
RUTH AYLETT reviews two collections of outright political poetry
ALAN MORRISON celebrates life and work of the late Tony Harrison, 1937-2025
A novel by Argentinian Jorge Consiglio, a personal dictionary by Uruguayan Ida Vitale, and poetry by Mexican Homero Aridjis
Travelogue/reportage by Argentinean Maria Sonia Cristoff, and poetry by Peruvian Gaston Fernandez and Puerto Rican Cristina Perez Diaz