The latest issue of The Manchester Review is a little late due to the volume of submissions we have been sifting and reviewing over the past two months, so that we could present the work you see before you by such a range of writers from different parts of the UK, Europe and the wider world.
Bei Dao’s affecting memoir of his return to Beijing, and his memories of a city that is no longer there, will strike a chord with readers considering the tumultuous changes currently being engineered in this country and in its international relationships. We are delighted to be publishing his work in the Review, alongside poetry from North America, New Zealand, Australia and many parts of Ireland and the UK, with Michael Symmons Roberts’ Mancunia poems rubbing shoulders with Helen Cross’s story of the northeast, Bill Manhire’s “beautiful world” with Janet Rogerson’s New York and Joey Connolly’s Netherlands.
As ever, the reviews section responds to new work in theatre, film, poetry and fiction, in the northwest and farther afield, and it continues to sprawlingly capture some of the many elements of the creative life of this city. We hope you’ll read your way through the poems, essays, reviews and stories here and help us, via social media and recommendations, to send them on their way to new readers.