Reviews of A New Kind Of Wilderness, The Marching Band, Good One and Magic Farm by MARIA DUARTE, ANDY HEDGECOCK and MICHAL BONCZA
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Raising the red flag in Wales
ROBERT GRIFFITHS reviews two recent books on the history of communism in Wales
SCOTT ALSWORTH foresees the coming of the smaller, leaner, and class conscious indie studio, with art as its guiding star
MARJORIE MAYO recommends an accessible and unsettling novel that uses a true incident of death in the Channel to raise questions of wider moral responsibility
MIK SABIERS wallows in a night of political punk and funk that fires both barrels at Trump
Reasonable radicalism, death in Abu Dhabi, locked-room romance, and sleuthing in the Blitz
SIMON DUFF recommends a new album from renowned composer and oud player Anour Brahem.
JAMES WALSH has a great night in the company of basketball players, quantum physicists and the exquisite timing of Rosie Jones
The Communist Party of Great Britain and the National Question in Wales 1920-1991
Douglas Jones
(University of Wales Press, £19.99)
Ar Drywydd Niclas y Glais: Comiwnydd Rhonc a Christion Gloyw
Hefin Wyn
(Y Lolfa, £14.99)
COMMUNISTS, socialists and others with an interest in modern Welsh and political history owe a debt of gratitude to Douglas Jones.
He has researched and analysed a wide range of information with scholarly rigour and — here’s the part which eludes far too many historians today — written it all up in straightforward English.
From the outset, the Communist Party in Wales had firm, organic roots not only in the working-class movement but also in Welsh-language culture.
Although the South Wales Socialist Society had fallen into some disrepair in the course of the imperialist Great War, it nonetheless comprised one of the founding organisations of the Communist Party of Great Britain. Most of its members were militant miners, with a sprinkling of railway and other industrial workers.
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