STEPHANIE BROWN draws attention to the hidden labour of the female embroiderers, and how a 19th century replica made no such error
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21st-century poetry
Latest collections from Farid Bitar, Simon Haines, Michael Crowley and Martin Hayes
RESPONDING TO THE NEWS: Simon Haines
MIK SABIERS revels in a band that ploughs an idiosyncratic furrow of expletive laden, guitar-driven alt rock
ANDY HEDGECOCK, MARIA DUARTE and ANGUS REID review Synthetic Sincerity, Our Hero, Balthazar, Heartstopper Forever, and A Year In London
The bard invites readers to a gig, raps for Clacton, and lays out the Burnham-Hurzeler conundrum
RON JACOBS recommends an important book that enhances the oppositional theories put forth by Fanon and, in doing so, remakes psychology itself
JAN WOOLF relishes an extensive history of our long relationship to trees in Britain that underlines the current emergency
DIANE WATT argues that while evidence of sex is not there, a 16th‑century lesbian poet could be Scotland’s answer to Gentleman Jack
THE title poem of Farid Bitar’s Screaming Olives (Smokestack, £8.99) is about the million Palestinian olive trees cut down by the Israeli authorities and settlers since 1967 in order to ruin the Palestinian economy and uproot Palestinian culture.
These are poems about a country that no longer exists but refuses to die. They are about occupation, resistance and resilience and are a demand for the right of return for the five million Palestinians living in exile.
Bitar — who has lived in exile for 40 years — connects the story of his “stolen homeland” to stories of oppression and injustice everywhere: “Emmett Till lynched in 1955/Way down near Selma Alabama/Ali on Grill, the settler taunted/Burned in Duma-West Bank-Palestine in 2015/ Mississippi still.”
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