Poetry review – EMERGENCY DREAM: Pat Edwards admires the way that Polly Atkin’s poetry links the personal with wider societal and global issues
politics
Poetry review – THE ALDERBANK WADE: Nick Cooke considers a Civil War ‘novel in verse’ by Alan Morrison
Poetry review – EVIDENCE OF WAR Jennifer Johnson considers Alan Price’s perspective on the tragedy still unfolding in Palestine
Poetry review – LANDSCAPE WITH MINES: Peter Ualrig Kennedy is moved by the strength and immediacy of Anna Bowles’ poetry in this impressive pamphlet.
CORONATION STREETS: ENGLAND THEN AND NOW: John Lucas reflects upon Chris Arnot’s account of how England has changed since the 1953 coronation
Poetry review – REPUBLIC: Pat Edwards reviews an unusual and original collection of prose-poems by Nerys Williams
Poetry review – MAD PARADE: Rennie Halstead reflects on the durability of Neil Fulwood’s political poetry
Poetry review – THE BIG CALLS: Thomas Ovans is quick to admire Glyn Maxwell’s furious lament over the current state of England
Poetry review – SANCTUARY: THERE MUST BE SOMEWHERE: Tim Murphy considers Angela Graham’s thought-provoking – and mildly collaborative – debut collection
European Solidarity Centre, by Barbara Lewis. Many of us can spell Solidarnosc, because we’ve seen it written so many times in the bold, red logo created by Jerzy Janiszewski in the early days of the Solidarnosc movement credited with toppling Communism in eastern Europe and leading to the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Poetry review – YOU HAVE NO NORMAL COUNTRY TO RETURN TO: Alwyn Marriage finds herself sharing some of the discontent expressed in Tom Sastry’s poems
Poetry review – SIGNALS TO THE DISAPPEARING SHORE: Kate Ashton is moved and impressed by these poems in which Aidan Semmens confronts dark episodes in world history, both past and present
By Michael Bartholomew-Biggs • books, history, poetry reviews, politics, year 2026 • Tags: books, history, Kate Ashton, poetry, politics