Aug 19, 2006
Book Review: The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia by Michael Gray (Continuum) The Guardian Review, 19 August Dylan’s work merits encyclopedic treatment not only because of its intrinsic richness and cultural import, but also because of its multi-sided, history-fraught nature. He crosses many boundaries. His sources are bewilderingly multiple. His evolution is complex, marked by political, aesthetic… Read more
Jun 27, 2006
The Guardian, 27 June [NB. Postscript below] As has been widely noted, this World Cup has witnessed an unprecedented display of England flags. Less noted is the fact that this display is far more extensive than in other countries. There’s no parallel, for example, in Holland and Italy, though both boast fanatical football cultures. We’re… Read more
May 15, 2006
Do you have to be religious to understand sacred music? Comment is free, The Guardian, 15 May I was with a group of westerners attending a a concert of Carnatic music – south India’s classical music – in Chennai. An affluent looking middle aged man in the row in front of us turned and smiled. He… Read more
Apr 12, 2006
The clash between multiculturalists and integrationists hides the hard issues of injustice The Guardian, April 12 The punch line goes like this: “Because he worked in the family business, lived at home till he was 30 and thought his mother was a virgin.” When I first heard it, that was the answer to the question:… Read more
Mar 11, 2006
The Guardian, 11 March Review of The Match by Romesh Gunesekera (Bloomsbury) Two cricket matches bookend Romesh Gunesekera’s new novel. The first is a local, one-off, comically amateur challenge between expats in the Philippines in 1970. The second is an all-star televised clash at the Oval in 2002. Despite cricket’s longevity and aura of aestheticism,… Read more
Jan 4, 2006
The Guardian, December 31 Review: Dream Boogie: The Triumph of Sam Cooke by Peter Guralnick (Little, Brown) If Sam Cooke had created nothing but the posthumously released “A Change Is Gonna Come”, the first masterpiece of socially conscious soul and one of the shining artistic legacies of the civil rights movement, he would still be… Read more
Nov 27, 2005
Poem published in Future Welcome: The Moosehead Anthology 10 edited by Todd Swift Heeding the call In the night-wind the house quakes. Its arthritic timbers mutter sarcastically, and chase me pyjama-clad into the empty, watchful garden. Agricultural vehicles like steel-limbed insects ply the lanes, igniting the hedgerows. Nettles probe the air. On patrol in the… Read more
Oct 1, 2005
Red Pepper, October 2005 It’s strange that a media obsessed with Brit winners managed to overlook a major success by a British filmmaker at this year’s Cannes festival: Kim Longinotto’s prize-winning documentary, Sisters in Law. Perhaps it’s because Longinotto’s quietly unsensational portrait of African women struggling for self-determination defies received notions about both women and… Read more
