ANDY HEDGECOCK, MARIA DUARTE and ANGUS REID review Synthetic Sincerity, Our Hero, Balthazar, Heartstopper Forever, and A Year In London
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Still struggling after all these years
The poet starving in a garret is a well-known literary trope, but a black woman poet writing about the enduring legacies of British slavery is less so. JENNY MITCHELL explains why
AWAKENED IN AFRICA: Jenny Mitchell
[Billy Grant]
KEITH RICHMOND relishes a superbly conceived modern version of Aeschylus’ drama of murderous family succession
MICHAL BONCZA recommends a minimalist installation that prompts intriguing connotations
FIONA O’CONNOR questions the achievement of this year’s Orwell prize winner for political fiction
LEO BOIX reviews two powerful Latin American novels in which myth and crime fiction expose the deadly consequences of patriarchy, clandestine abortion and state violence
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Ron's rages are sincere and — according to his wife — healthily cathartic. But can these splenetic outbursts loosen the grip of capitalism at its most monstrous?
MY SECOND poetry collection, Map of a Plantation, examines why the contested history of transatlantic enslavement ensures a structural path or “map” that restricts black people, on the whole, to servile positions within Britain.
My starting point is my own working life and long journey to becoming a poet. Although born in Britain, I often felt unwelcome and see that my education in a “failing” Kilburn school was preparation to work in a shop or a hospital.
This path was diverted when, at 15, I was one of 10 winners in a London-wide poetry competition. My school labelled me exceptional and I was supported to get into a good university.
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