Circa Survive, The Amulet (Hopeless Records, 2017). Signs for this record, the sixth studio album from Philadelphia’s Circa Survive, were looking more than good ever since they began releasing teaser tracks in the summer, four in total: ‘Lustration’, ‘Rites of Investiture’, ‘The Amulet’ and ‘Premonition of the Hex’. The consistency and excellence of those releases […]
Chris Kraus, After Kathy Acker: A Biography, reviewed by NJ Stallard
An Evening With Chris Kraus, in conversation with Kaye Mitchell; Waterstone’s, Deansgate, September 27, 2017. “Hope not 2 offend but if I die please dont let the frenemy w whom I shared a bf read my diaries & write my biog” wrote artist Jesse Darling, in a recent tweet, regarding the launch of Chris Kraus’s […]
Bill Knott, I Am Flying Into Myself: Selected Poems 1960-2014, reviewed by Ian Pople
Bill Knott, I Am Flying Into Myself: Selected Poems 1960-2014, edited with an introduction by Thomas Lux (Farar, Straus and Giroux, $28.00). In his introduction to Bill Knott’s Selected, Thomas Lux comments that Knott’s first book, Nights of Naomi was ‘straight from the surrealist manifestos, but entirely his own. The poems are violent, dark and […]
Our Town, Royal Exchange Theatre, reviewed by Peter Wild
Our Town by Thorton Wilder, directed by Sarah Frankcom; Royal Exchange Theatre, 19 September 2017. First premiered on Broadway back in 1938, Thornton Wilder’s Our Town is a play with a long history of being done wrong – whether that was as a result of overt sentimentalisation (as was the case at its debut), by […]
Robert Lowell, New Selected Poems, reviewed by Ian Pople
Robert Lowell, New Selected Poems, ed. Katie Peterson (Faber, £14.99). If you came to poetry in the sixties and seventies, you came to Robert Lowell. His volume, Life Studies, seemed to dominate the perspective on poetry, in the way that The Whitsun Weddings, Crow or Ariel did, in their own way. One way in which […]
Sarah Tierney, Making Space, reviewed by Tom Patterson
Sarah Tierney, Making Space (Sandstone, £8.99). Making Space is a strong debut novel from University of Manchester alumnus Sarah Tierney. It features Manchester’s Northern Quarter bars, rainy streets and converted Victorian housing in a way that moves beyond signposting without simply being a love letter to a time and a place. It was very easy […]
Ian Parks, Citizens, reviewed by Ian Pople
Ian Parks, Citizens (Smokestack Books, £7.99). Over the years, Ian Parks has produced about a dozen books and pamphlets, from a variety of publishers. His shtick seems to be to have a new book out with a new publisher. But that variety of publisher never seems to diminish or dilute the quality of Parks’ writing, […]
Edward Doegar, For Now and Rebecca Tamás, Savage (Clinic Press), reviewed by Annie Muir
Two strikingly presented new pamphlets have been published by Clinic this year – Edward Doegar’s For Now with its bold misaligned capitals and Rebecca Tamás’s Savage with its inverted abstract countryside scene. Fifteen and nine poems respectively, both offer a one-sitting-sized taste of their author’s main concerns. Doegar’s first poem ‘Anon’ begins: I don’t want […]
John Singer Sargent, The Watercolours, Dulwich Picture Gallery, reviewed by Ian Pople
John Singer Sargent, The Watercolours, Dulwich Picture Gallery, 21 June – 8 October 2017. This is not the first exhibition of Sargent’s watercolours; a little fossicking around on the web will find you a YouTube video of comparable exhibitions in Houston and Boston. So, why is it that a painter known mostly for his turn-of-the-twentieth-century […]
Tara Bergin, The Tragic Death of Eleanor Marx, reviewed by Chloé S. Vaughan
Tara Bergin, The Tragic Death of Eleanor Marx (Carcanet Press, £9.99). It’s been four years since Tara Bergin’s debut collection This is Yarrow hit shelves and deservedly snagged both the 2014 Seamus Heaney Award and 2014 Shine/Strong Poetry Award. In this brief absence, Bergin has not merely been looking out of her office window for […]
Three pamphlets, reviewed by Ian Pople
Julie Mellor, Out of the Weather (Smith Doorstep, £5.00); Nigel Pantling, Kingdom Power Glory (Smith Doorstop, £9.95); Nicki Heinen, Itch (Eyewear Lorgnette Series, £6.00). In Julie Mellor’s poem ‘Propolis’, she writes ‘In truth, it’s not propolis I’m talking about,/ but those unwanted spaces where words land and rest’. There’s an interesting mixing of metaphor here. […]
Bluedot: Frank Cottrell Boyce and Geoff White, reviewed by Usma Malik
Frank Cottrell Boyce and Geoff White; Bluedot, Jodrell Bank Observatory, Orbit stage, July 8 2017. Just as science and theory offer endless opportunities to invent and reinvent stories, so do our existing narratives, and the ‘What if?’ question pops up again, this time in Frank Cottrell Boyce’s incredibly entertaining talk. Stories? He queries. Oh, stories, […]
Bluedot: Sara Maitland, Adam Marek, Dr Rob Appleby, Ra Page, reviewed by Usma Malik
How to Write Science-fiction: Sara Maitland, Adam Marek, Dr Rob Appleby, and Ra Page; Bluedot, Jodrell Bank Observatory, Orbit stage, July 8-9 2017. When a Science-fiction writer’s panel kicks off with the sound of foxes howling you know you’re in for an interesting ride. The three men sitting on the front row are in full […]
Bluedot: Tony Walsh and Dr Marcus Chown, reviewed by Usma Malik
Bluedot, Jodrell Bank Observatory, Orbit stage, July 7 2017. Science, Storytelling, Magic and the Universe. It’s been a starry three days at the 2017 Bluedot Festival. I would have loved to cover it all, unfortunately the TARDIS was in for repairs and so I had to make do with my, limited, human resources and the […]
Manchester International Festival: Returning to Reims, reviewed by Imogen Durant
Returning to Reims, dir. Thomas Ostermeier; HOME, July 11 2017. Thomas Ostemeier brings a work of creative non-fiction by Didier Eribon to life in this thought-provoking performance. A personal memoir with a political focus, the 2009 book by the French sociologist which gives this performance its title offers a penetrating examination of the social forces […]
Penelope Shuttle, Will you walk a little faster?, reviewed by Ken Evans
Penelope Shuttle, Will you walk a little faster? (Bloodaxe Books, £9.95). The eponymous title poem of Penelope Shuttle’s latest collection, Will you walk a little faster?, keen ‘Alice’ fans will know, is a line from ‘The Mock Turtle Song’ in Lewis Carroll’s, Alice in Wonderland. The minimalist simplicity of Shuttle’s form here, is not a […]
21 Today: The Rise of African Speculative Fiction, introduction
Some people think literature means anything that’s written. Some people think it’s writing that’s good or truthful. Other people try to define literature as a set of reader expectations. For me, literature is a social process. Literature is a social process that makes aesthetic judgements and facilitates the production and consumption of writing. Everybody says […]
Part One: Lift Off
• A woman who is a walking advertisement • A flying car from the future • Fire comes to Uganda ‘Branded’ (2003) by Lauren Beukes (South Africa) ‘Warp’ (2004) by Ayodele Arigbabu (Nigeria) ‘Eden’s Burning’ (2008) by Doreen Baingana (Uganda) ‘Doppelgänger’ (2008) by Peter Kalu (Nigeria/UK) ‘Branded’ is the only story in this collection that […]
Branded
We were at Stones, playing pool, drinking, goofing around, maybe hoping to score a little sugar, when Kendra arrived, all moffied up and gloaming like an Aito/329. “Ahoy, Special K, where you been, girl, so juiced to kill?” Tendeka asked while he racked up the balls, all click-clack in their white plastic triangle. Old school […]
Warp
The time warp occurred at exactly 12 noon. It was perfect timing. A labour strike in protest against fuel price increase had just been called off. Lagos was trying to find its feet. Three different convoys with ‘about to wed’ covering the number plates of their lead cars sped past me while I awaited my […]
Eden’s Burning
The first angry woman spat at her world. Kazi read the brilliant faces of the stars and found that the past was not empty: it could be explored. Amazed by the revelation, she ran through the Circle, shaking everyone awake and shouting excitedly into their sleepy faces: “We belong to the sky!” They laughed at […]
Doppelgänger
Tunde is back from hospital. It’s a miracle. He kissed me and said I was the only person who ever mattered to him and I was why he pulled through. Then he broke down and cried and me with him, so help me God. He’s quite unsteady on his feet. I didn’t sleep all night […]
Part Two: Publishing Venues, Workshops and Awards
• London’s famous statues come to life • Intelligent primates teach a young woman how to tell stories • An ancient African technology is rediscovered… ‘Please Feed Motion’ (2011) by Irenosen Okojie (Nigeria/UK) ‘How Nnedi got Her Curved Spine’ (2012) by Nnedi Okorafor (Nigeria/USA) ‘The Writing in the Stars’ (2015) by Jonathan Dotse (Ghana) ‘Mother’s […]
Please Feed Motion
On the third Thursday of each month, Nesrine Malik, prisoner 2212 pulled skin from the thing living in her throat before writing to Eros. She performed this ritual without fail and had done for four years since landing at Woodowns prison on drug charges as an accessory with intent to supply. Nesrine had arrived with […]
How Nnedi Got Her Curved Spine
In a forest of South Eastern Nigeria lived a tribe of large baboons called the Idiok. They were regal creatures with thick brown fur, black ears, careful hands and golden eyes. They were wise and peaceful, and at night when the moon was high and full, they could easily find each other because their eyes […]
The Writing in the Stars
The Guardian spurred his horse on to a full gallop through the narrow, winding streets of the old city, followed closely by five companions, leaving behind the chaotic sounds of iron clashing in vain against the thundering fire of the invaders. The four raced towards the outskirts of the city, to the edge of the […]
Mother’s Love
“Force-feed the heretics! The monotheists, the abominations, all of them! Let them know the taste of freedom!” The Archbishop’s thunderous voice shook Anointing Square, his words slightly out of sync with the movement of his lips and the rest of his face, as it glared down from the video screen that covered the entire north […]
Part Three: Superheroes, Gods and Politics
The Last Pantheon (2015) by Nick Wood and Tade Thompson (Nigeria, South Africa, UK) parts 1, 2, and 3. Khamzila’s Adventure – graphic novel (2016) by Ziphosakhe Hlobo and Lena Posch, art by Ethnique Nicole Leonards, with afterword by Monde Sitole (South Africa) Wale Awelenje was showing me a sequence from the comic Might of […]
The Last Pantheon, part 1
Prologue February 18, 1979 Sahara Desert, Africa My hands are deep in sand, and there is blood on the snow. He did not know why there was snow. He tried to rise, but it was not time. His breath came in ragged gasps, a death rattle? His ribs grated on each other when he inspired. […]
The Last Pantheon, part 2
Chapter Six 2015 South Africa Black-Power wrapped his cape around him, feeling all the more fearsome for it. The two men facing him didn’t take their cues, one clicking the safety off his pistol, the other steadying his automatic rifle. He waved Thembeka behind him, so that she was completely hidden behind his massive bulk. […]
The Last Pantheon, part 3
Chapter Eleven 1978 Lagos, Nigeria Space. He was not really here. This was a memory or a dream. Hanging there was a space station, spiky, crystalline almost. The hull was grown by a layer of bacteria genetically modified to produce the bulkhead. It was constantly sheared off and constantly regrown. Inside, there were hundreds of […]
Part Four: South African Conundrums
• In the dimension of the dead, all of South African history is present at once – and the dead must atone for their crimes • A white woman takes her black lover to visit her parents, but he’s been bitten by a dead dog and is acting strangely ‘Stations’ (2015) by Nick Mulgrew (South […]
Stations
I I was alive. I was dead. That’s as much as I knew. I want to tell you I woke, but I don’t think I was ever asleep. I had passed through. Or something. There’s no way to explain it, unless it were to happen to you. I was disappointed at first that I couldn’t […]
Shame
“It’s a dead dog, for Christ’s sake, Thulani. I don’t know why –” Thulani brings the car to a halt far too fast for the gravel road, and we slew sideways as we come to a standstill. I can tell he’s being stubborn from the way he juts out his chin. Mulish, I’ve called him, […]